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Now ladies, do these underpants look like they clean themselves. . . or do you care?

The other day a load of young players of our acquaintance in a club somewhere in Ireland were making final arrangements to head off around the world. These guys have done the business for their club and are now heading off hoping to do the business in various locations around the globe before returning to duty in March-ish.

All we will say is that some lucky young ladies have an interesting experience ahead of them. The reason? It emerged in the final seconds between packing the bags and shopping for those last moment briefs that one of the lads had solved the boxer short conundrum. Our man wasn’t worrying about how many pairs to bring, taking into account the perils of lack of washing facilities, coupled with the inevitable bouts of explosive bowel activity brought on by rich spicy food and new bacteria. No, our intrepid traveller and ambassador for his club had taken himself off to the local specialist outdoor goods shop and got himself a shiny pair of ’self cleaning underpants’. These innovative trunks can apparently go a good ten days or so before they needed to see the inside of a washing machine.

Talking Balls feels it important that the wider GAA public knows that this is the sort of louche behaviour that is practised by the young player of today. Back in the days when the likes of Ger Manas prowled the square, young fellas were sent out in clean underpants usually Y Fronts, with their name stitched carefully on by an attentive mother along with the legend ‘If in an accident, my son is a Catholic. Please call a priest.”

This man, as we speak is making his way though South East Asia, clad in these briefs. He will no doubt be left untouched and unbothered by hookers, lady boys, muggers, Aussie Rules agents, drug peddlars, Russian Roulette players a la deer hunter. No, not a bit because he is protected by the power and possibly the strange smell within – the self cleaning underpants. Of course unfortunately for him he may also remain untouched and unbothered by any young ladies similarly trekking round the world having done the business for club and county. For them, the man with the self cleaning underpants may be a match too far.