BETWEEN his finger and his thumb the squat dart rests. He lines up its point with the treble 20 bed and lets fly, fully expecting it to sink delightfully into its welcoming red corkiness.
With a CLACK it hits the cupboard. The flight goes one way, the barrel scoots in under the fridge and there’s another little hole in a door that already looks like an army of woodworm have been feasting on it.
That’s the way it has been in our house. Old darts were located, the trusty Winmau board was dusted off and any amount of scoring apps downloaded for a frenzy of darts action over the festive season.
Initially it was inspired by Brendan Dolan’s brilliant win over Gerwyn Price. It’s a long while sense I watched sport on TV through sweaty fingers whispering prayers but that’s what I was doing when Dolan stepped up to sink doubles against Price and in the next round against Gary Anderson.
To get knocked out by the phenomenal Luke Littler at the quarter-final stage was no shame for the affable Fermanagh native who, it seems, is as comfortable playing darts in Fitzys in Blacklion as he is at the Ally Pally.
Littler captured everyone’s imagination. A man-child at 16-years of age, he’d need to bring his birth certificate and photo ID to get a game for the U20s. He didn’t win the World Championship but surely he will do because he’s the most naturally gifted player I’ve ever seen. Phil Taylor and the other greats have won far more but when did you ever seen anyone who can go round the board with such amazing quick fire accuracy Littler can.
I didn’t see the final. I was in Kingspan Breffni to watch Cavan versus Derry and, like Littler, new kids on the block caught the eye as they did all they could to impress their new managers.
There was a decent crowd in the stand as there always is at Breffni Park and a sizeable media crew to watch Mickey Harte’s first game in charge of Derry and his team, including six debutants in the starting line-up and a few more off the bench including young Cahir McMonagle who split the Breffni posts with his first kick as a senior inter-county player.
McMonagle was one of four players from the Steelstown club in Derry City who played on Wednesday night. The others were corner-back Diarmuid Baker, midfielder Donncha Gilmore and corner-forward Ben McCarron and all four of them scored. Great news for the club which is named in memory of Brian Og McKeever, a Derry U15 and U16 player, who would have gone on to represent club and county at senior level had his life not been cut so tragically short by cancer.
“I’m delighted for them,” said Harte.
“I have a soft spot in my heart for the Steelstown Brian Og club. I met that young man back in his last few days and a lovely fella. A lovely family and it was great for those men from the Steelstown club that they could do him proud tonight.”
Up in Donegal, 18-year-old Finbar Roarty got a start against Armagh. The schoolboy hadn’t yet played senior football for his club Naomh Conaill but Jim McGuinness threw him in and Roarty impressed with an early assist for a Michael Langan goal.
Meanwhile, Armagh rested their senior panel and fielded an entire team of youngsters. The Orchard county lads who played did themselves proud and they will have enjoyed and hopefully benefited from the experience of playing for their county but they were thrown in at the deep end.
You might wonder what was the point of sending a rookie team to Ballybofey to get a 16-point hammering from Donegal. What’s the point of entering the competition if you’re not at all interested in winning it?
Then again, Kieran McGeeney has been around long enough to know exactly what he’s got to work with and the players should know the system he wants to play by now.
You could argue that putting a focus into a competition that has no real impact on League performance might actually lower intensity levels in training.
Maybe the Armagh camp feel the players get drawn into an ‘only the McKenna Cup’ mindset and prefer to concentrate on challenge games in which only players with a realistic chance of playing senior football this season are involved.
That’s their prerogative of course but, if every county felt like that, it would be the end of the road for the McKenna Cup and that would be a shame for supporters who enjoy the post-Christmas, pre-season competition that shortens the winter a little.
The McKenna Cup will keep going as long as Mickey Harte has anything to do with it. Harte doesn’t do friendlies and has always maintained that the McKenna Cup is the best way to blood new hopefuls and the smoothest passage between pre-season and League season.
In all fairness, Harte hasn’t done too badly in his career with that philosophy but whatever works is best, there’s no one-size-fits-all blueprint in GAA.
Same as darts.
I’m away to hoke that barrel out from under the fridge…