Waxing Lyrical: Tyrone’s Beards Inspire the Ladies
Talking Balls
There has been much speculation in the media in recent weeks on the reasons for Tyrone’s increasingly hirsute appearance in their championship matches. According to one story Mickey Harte, himself no stranger to a bit of facial hair, told an inspirational story at training one night about Samson and Delilah that led some of the lads to abandon the Gillette Mach 3 and let their hair down.
Defender Ciaran Gourley offers a more prosaic take on things explaining that as a teacher by profession he simply was too lazy to shave during the summer holidays from school. That may explain his own appearance and that of Joe McMahon but what of Martin Penrose, Ryan McMenanim and old ginger beard himself Owen Mulligan?
What then can the punters expect to see when Tyrone take the field on Sunday? Will it look like Osama Bin Laden and the boys have abandoned the Jihad to kick a bit of ball for the Red Hands? Time will tell.
Worryingly, Talking Balls has learned (as we do) that emboldened by the actions of the Tyrone players, a number of camogie and ladies football teams are considering what they might ‘grow’ as a team building exercise. Derry Ladies Football skipper Louise Glass ponders the matter in her column on RTE.ie saying:
“I was wondering what ‘challenge’ us lady footballers could set ourselves as we get down to the last two games of the season. Well, the most obvious one is not shaving our legs. . . we could do a Julia Roberts and not shave our underarms, but again there’s no maximum impact visible unless of course for the winning team, dressed in their best dresses for the post-final dinner. But then that’s really not the best way to promote the ‘lady’ in the lady footballer!! I’m running out of options here - we could grow our fingernails. . .”
There is of course one other option. . . but then that wouldn’t be just like watching Brazil. Still, anyone for a bit of samba?