Leaning Over the Wire
Talking Balls No Comments »
And so we have had Padraic Duffy show some sort of bewilderment that there was any sort of difficulty over the issue of the underhand hand pass and the underhand manner of its introduction. Now, slaves as we are to the bloody rulebook, we are stuck with the implications of this decision for the conceivable future.
Added to that has been the inability of the referees of Ireland to apply the rule consistently, even the rule we already had that worked perfectly well. And so we have a troupe of these referee fellas going about, each one with their own little bugbear.
One has a thing about lifting the ball of the ground – maybe he got blown up in the final minute of an Under 12 Final fifty years ago and vowed revenge on the GAA ever since. Get over it already will you?
Another man has a bee in his bonnet about over-carrying the ball. He too was blown up as a minor about to burst the net in an Under 16 C final in darkest Tipp years ago. Ever since, he was vowed death to the over-carrier.
Another. Players stealing yards at frees has been his crutch ever since his beloved St Lughnasa’s were beaten with the last kick of a game when the hoor taking the last minute free stole some extra yards. ‘I’ll show them bastards’ he vowed before embarking on a career fuelled by revenge.
Another man loved to hop the ball at every opportunity, wracked as he was by indecision. Another foible has come back to haunt the same lad with the change to the line ball rule and where it can be taken from.He now is fixated and addicted to white lines.
These freelance referees are wreaking havoc with and without the rulebook. But for those who think this is a problem, you are mistaken. Paddy Heaney of the Irish News had the temerity to question the whole matter of refereeing and where it was going. For his trouble Paddy received an admonitory call from Croke Park and received a slap on the wrists. It’s a case of we’re right, you’re wrong and woe betide anyone says different.
So it was with some bemusement that we read today that the Uachtarán admitted that the GAA had got something wrong. Apparently he accepts that playing a Munster Championship Hurling semi-final on a wet Bank Holiday Monday wasn’t a good idea. But when we went on we breathed a sigh of relief, normal service resumed. It wasn’t Christy’s fauly after all, he didn’t get it wrong, that would be a step too far. Munster had got it wrong.
And up north, in the meantime we have the situation whereby through no fault of their own other than winning a match London are being asked to field for two championship matches on consecutive days. But according to the various PTBs this is no one fault only London’s (now how whoever suggested that one can operate that sort of logic defies us but whatever. Was it the Down manager?). Would Kilkenny be asked to present themselves for two championship matches in two days? Or Cork? Or Tyrone, Or Dublin. Bloody sure they wouldn’t. And is anything being done to sort it out?
For all these situations it’s time the GAA decided to start looking at what’s right and not who’s right. One road leads to the continued success and progress. The other leads backwards to the darks ages with grown men playing chicken with each other, neither prepared to budge. Time to move on lads. You’re becoming a laughing stock.
When one of the country’s leading footballers says he wouldn’t watch a match he wasn’t playing in. . . we have a problem Houston.
