Anyone that knows me, knows I love the GAA, well hurling anyway but if your’re a part of a club then you have to take the good with the bad and that means that us hurling people have to try at least to love football too. I’m joking of course. I love a good game of football as much as the next man or woman but a bad game of football….don’t get me started.
It’s no secret that people ‘outside of the GAA’ love to knock it. At times they are justified and at times it’s just ridiculous. In my view the GAA, in the whole, is a wonderful organisation that has done and continues to do wonderful things for sport in Ireland and the people of Ireland. One of the best things about the GAA is sense of identity that it gives people. Whether that is with their local parish club or their county. It gives people the perfect opportunity to be proud of where they are from and I think that’s brilliant.
One of the other and most magnificent things about the GAA is Croke Park. Every time I walk down Jones’ Road and into Croke Park I’m struck by what a magnificent stadium it is and it is something that every GAA person should be very proud of indeed.
There are of course elements of the GAA that some of us don’t like and other elements that just baffle us. One aspect that definitely falls into the latter category is GAA politics, something that is as alive and well in the GAA of 2014, almost 2015, than it ever was. Having attended AGM’s in my own club for many many years I could never and still cannot get my head around the desire of people to get involved as GAA administrators and yet the country is full of them and there always seems to be younger folk coming up ready to carry on the tradition.
Don’t get me wrong, the vast majority of GAA administrators are great and after all, where would we be without them? Running a GAA club, division or county board, regardless of the size or level of success, is no easy job and hats off to all who give so much of their time to their club or county for little if any reward. I just can’t see the buzz that these people obviously get from it. And quite clearly they do or why else would they enter contests for positions before then moving on up the ever ending ladder of positions…..divisional board, county board, Munster Council, Central Council…..President of the GAA…the line of hierachy seems endless.
To me playing was great (even if I wasn’t very good, unfortunately) and in recent years I’ve really enjoyed getting involved as a selector with various teams, that’s a great buzz too, but the administration side of the GAA isn’t for me (and feel free to have a right go off me in 10 years time if you hear I’ve just been appointed as Chairman of the club, but I very much doubt it.)
On Thursday night the Waterford GAA Co. Convention will take place in Lawlor’s Hotel in Dungarvan and the run up to this meeting has seen GAA politics in the Déise county in full flow. There are three contests down for decision. The main one is the battle for the Chairmanship which will be contested between Tim O’Byrne of Erin’s Own and the East and Paddy Joe Ryan of Fourmilewater/The Nire and the West. This will be a hard fought battle and I know that both men have been busy canvassing every delegate and club in the county over recent months to help secure the much needed votes to see their bids for the top job (for a second time in Paddy Joe’s case) over the line.
Again this is an aspect of the association that completely goes over my head. Canvassing for positions. Why would you want to go out and virtually beg people for a vote to serve on a board. Is it the power? An ego thing? I don’t know but I certainly haven’t been hit by that urge and can’t see that I ever will. But that doesn’t detract for one second from all those who do it and get a kick out of it. I’ve no doubt that both men want this job for the right reasons, to serve Waterford GAA as best as they can and help it to be as good and successful as it can be and good luck to them…may the best man win.
For the record the other contests on the agenda on Thursday night are the battle for the treasurer’s position, between the incumbent Joe Cleary and John Jackson, former County Board PRO and the joust for the Central Council delegate which is a three way battle bewteen outgoing Chairman, Tom Cunningham, Pat Flynn and Tommy Hennessy. Phil Fanning has more about the convention in our GAA section, but best of luck to all involved.
GAA conventions were brought into sharp focus this week when Roisín Jordan was elected as the chair of the Tyrone County Board and in doing so she became the first ever woman to become the chairman/chairperson of a County adult board. While it is amazing that it has taken 130 years of the GAA for this to happen, it is also not surprising when one looks at the paltry number of women who hold positions of power and club and county level throughout the GAA. Indeed Waterford is one of the exceptions rather than the rule, with Emer Barry of Lismore looking set to be returned unopposed as the County PRO. Maybe Roisín Jordan’s election will signal an upturn in the amount of women in top county and club roles in the GAA. Let’s hope so.
THE GREAT JJ
This really has been the winter of inter-county retirements in the GAA, especially in hurling and in the past week yet another great has called time on a glittering career, Kilkenny’s JJ Delaney. In stepping aside he has joined fellow Cats, Tommy Walsh, Brian Hogan, Aidan Fogarty and David Herity, along with Tipp men John O’Brien and Eoin Kelly, Offaly’s Rory Hanniffy, Dublin’s Stephen Hiney and of course the Waterford trio of Seamus Prendergast, Stephen Molumphy and Shane Walsh.
Probably the most surprising of all was the decision of JJ Delaney to end his innings with Kilkenny, especially as he played a full role in all of Kilkenny’s games on the march to their latest Liam MacCarthy triumph in September. In my opinion JJ was one of the finest hurlers I ever saw play. Not only was he a beautifully stylish player but he was also tough as nails and could mix it with any sort of opponent. He also did something that’s most unusual at the highest level and that’s to go from being a brilliant wing-back to an equally good full-back. Most players struggle when moving from the half-backline to the full-backline but not JJ, he could have played anywhere. He was that good. For the record (and turn away now if you’re squeamish about Kilkenny’s hurling achievements) JJ won 8 All-Irelands, 11 Leinsters, 8 National Hurling Leagues, 7 All-Stars, 2 Fitzgibbons and a Hurler of the Year award. Now that’s a hurling cv.
ARSENE AND THE ARSENAL FANS
Long time readers of this column will know that I am a long suffering Arsenal fan….one, two three…aaaawwwww. I know it could be worse, I could be a Liverpool fan or a Leeds fan or something like that (joking) but there’s no doubt that these are difficult times for us Gunners and also for our manager, Arsene Wenger.
While never joining the Arsene out brigade, mainly as it’s futile because Wenger will never be sacked and he will go when he wants to go, any Arsenal fan in their right mind would have to be frustrated by certain things the boss has done in recent years. The most glaringly obvious is his reluctance to strengthen his defence and defensive midfield options in recent years when the whole world could see how badly it needed revamping and re-enforcing.
That said, Wenger has been a great manager for Arsenal and therefore the video of him being abused by so called Arsenal fans at a train station in Stoke recently was vile and totally out of order. That is not on and I know that 99% of Arsenal fans would be of that mind.
Of course he has done wonderful things for the club, like the league titles, FA Cups, the invincibles, the new stadium et al, but he has also made lots of mistakes and has plenty of failings….the biggest of those being his stubborness. But nothing warrants that sort of treatment.
I do however, think it’s a bit rich for former ‘greats’ (of other clubs) coming out and telling Arsenal fans (all of us, not just the train station louts) that we don’t deserve Arsene Wenger….really? Butt out.
