PLAY it again, Sam. How unusual must it have been to be involved in the build-up to the All-Ireland final replay in the last week and-a-half?
While the GAA will not be complaining, with the credit in the bank no doubt securing another healthy jump in profits, you can’t help thinking no-one from Dublin or Mayo would want to prolong the agony. Having played in a final with Down, which we lost by the most slender margin of one-point, I certainly would have taken a draw that day.
I can’t help but wonder, with ‘proper’ injury-time now being added onto the 70 minutes, how many drawn finals over the years may have had a different outcome? Seven minutes was appropriate last time out and I consider it a minimum requirement nowadays, given stoppages and time-wasting.
In truth though, replays are a scourge. In any other sporting final, be it Champions League, Superbowl or European Rugby Cup, the final is played until a winner emerges. However unfair reaching a decision by spot-kicks may seem, a replay is not even considered in any other sport.
Therefore, it must all come down to the money aspect for the GAA. From a playing perspective, who wants to delay the outcome on probably the biggest day in your football career, win or lose? You only have to look at factors such as supporters having to travel again, book rooms, delay holidays. When you consider that the hotel holding the banquet for either team presumably has to scrap everything and start from scratch, you have to ask the question, is it all necessary?
As regards the action on the field, do I think Mayo can win? Honestly, no. I think Mayo have missed their chance. Maybe the curse of 1951 does not apply to replays, but I just feel people have written off this Dublin team a bit prematurely.
They have questioned Dublin’s depth and whether Paul Flynn and Bernard Brogan have it in their legs anymore. I can see only minor changes from Dublin, the easy one being Paddy Andrews for Kevin McManamon. Gavin will see this from two angles. One, it shows the rest that, despite McManamon’s form to date, he will drop a player if he hasn’t performed. And secondly, he will trust the same man coming off the bench to have a huge influence over the outcome.
Brogan and Flynn are different. The former, at 32, still has that experience on big days when his back is to the wall. Surely he has enough credit in the bank, given the last decade with Dublin in similar circumstances. If Brogan is benched, he will almost feel like one of Ireland’s other corner-forwards when the big calls are needed to be taken.
Flynn has a handful of Allstars and, while not scoring as freely as before, he still racks up a huge workload and carries a physical presence in the half-forward line. He has suffered because the less glamorous box-to-box statistics tend to be overlooked when it comes to studying Dublin’s otherwise potent forward unit, especially when there are boys coming off the bench and scoring.
I feel that, if Dublin were to play as poorly as they did, Mayo would need to be as equally brilliant defensively and play much better as an attacking team. So is it too much to ask for ‘two perfect storms’ to occur within the space of two weeks?
To win the game, Mayo need to perform just as well defensively. They also need their ‘big’ players to turn up - Aidan O’Shea, his brother Séamus and Cillian O’Connor. Until they perform in a final, question marks will follow them around like a bad smell.
Donal Vaughan, Tom Parsons and Lee Keegan will need to deliver the same performances as the last day and I am surprised that, in some quarters, Lee Keegan’s reluctance to get forward is being jumped on as a negative in some chatter about the Westerners.
Have I been missing something my entire career? A defender’s first job is to defend. And Keegan managed that superbly in his duel with Connolly. I think keeping Connolly scoreless and curtailing his influence is a job in itself, never mind adding to Keegan’s duties. The Mayo defenders should continue where they left off and it is the Mayo forwards who need to stand up.
It will be a strange experience on Saturday and, with the air crisper and the evenings closing in, the final will no doubt conclude under floodlights. In that light, it will be back to discussing club finals and GAA policy and how we improve the game.
I know that, historically, the hurling and Gaelic football finals are played on the first and third Sundays in September, respectively. But given the reluctance to make any significant changes in GAA congress as regards bringing the finals forward a few weeks or, indeed, scrapping replays altogether, change either comes too slow or not at all from this particular democratic body.
I say ‘democratic’ in the loosest possible form - a two-thirds majority on most decisions is the most ‘undemocratic’ rule in the association. A complete overhaul of the association may be seen as a case of ‘too much, too soon’, but too many issues are prevalent and taking up column inches each week discussing ‘off field’ problems.
The GAA will again display how wonderful an association it is on Saturday, bringing supporters and sports fans from around the globe together. It is rightly revered and it inspires many. To retain this, it needs to change, sooner rather than later.
In such a dysfunctional and inefficient environment as congress, I cannot see a future with so many delegates. I understand everyone needs a say, but surely there are better ways. In businesses with PLCs, shareholders appoint a board of directors, who take decisions in the best interests of its members. If these decisions fail, the board is dismissed and replaced with new members, who all take decisions in the best interests of the company.
Maybe too radical. However, it’s surely worth talking about.
