“I’d be known for not blowing the whistle too much” It was a camogie match between Lavey and Bellaghy and the Bellaghy goalkeeper pulled a stroke so good that by the time timber met skin, she was already heading for the line. Down came Sean McGuigan, the teak tough and widely admired referee – the […]

6 years ago

You could run for Ireland but the only way you’re really going to reach your match fitness is by intense training and you guessed it…matches. These days, all sports people have been given a taste of the life of a distance runner; the loneliness of the long distance runner ain’t no myth, they’re finding out. […]

6 years ago

Larry Tompkins tore his cruciate in the 1990 All-Ireland final against Meath. He did not fall to the ground, did not signal for medical attention. Instead, he went onto kick two critical points that would inspire the Rebels to a famous, grudge win over the Royals. Now Tompkins doesn’t wear his stoicism as a badge […]

6 years ago

It was a sad Sunday in the parish of Corofin, according to the club’s chairman Michael Ryder. A fine wine, a willing stalwart. They thought he could go on forever but alas, miracle man Kieran Fitzgerald, one of the most decorated players in the history of club GAA, has brought the curtain down after a […]

6 years ago

Nice and handy today. Easy for a quizzer like you.

6 years ago

Ballaghaderreen. Kildare. Mayo. You could say he’d seen it all before. Before renowned Strength and Conditioning coach Barry Solan made the move across the water to work with Arsenal Football club as head S and C coach, he’d earned his crust with a number of GAA and rugby teams on these shores. And so, with […]

6 years ago

Over 14/20 is good going today. Sorry.

6 years ago

Work will be alright. The family will still be there. The hardest thing for Conor Moynagh, about leaving Drumgoon for the trip of a lifetime, was leaving a year of Gaelic football behind him. For more than ten years now, he’s been a beating heart for Breffni county football but there comes a time when […]

6 years ago

Michael McKillop is a realist. Schooled by the challenges, learned by the experiences. In 2018, a slight niggle turned into an injury nightmare for the record breaking athlete, who was sidelined for the guts of a year and a half with a mysterious and persistent groin problem. Dark days. Tough times. This battler has form, […]

6 years ago

As Pat Spillane famously once said, the viewer is only watching to decide if you’re a bollocks, or not a bollocks. Ger Loughnane could write the book on being called a bollocks. He’s past it. Just looking for a rise these days. Hurling has moved on without him. The Sunday Game would be a much […]

6 years ago

In Tipperary, they’ll never forget it. Ten years without an All-Ireland. Almost five minutes without a score. Nerves. Wides. Tension. The opening stages of the 2001 All-Ireland senior hurling final between them and neighbours Galway were error strewn and they were frantic. But Tommy Dunne had ice in the mind. Pulls, deflections and poor touches. […]

6 years ago

It’s not easy. It’s not meant to be.

6 years ago

Win or learn.

6 years ago

So you’ve watched a Year ‘Til Sunday and your mind is opened. Revitalised. If only you’d known the half of what you’d been missing out on. Perhaps to admit this, as a sports journalist, is to risk being lynched for lacking job suitability, but there was a time when Galway football did nothing for you, […]

6 years ago

So in one corner you’ve Ken McGrath. Skint head, scant teeth. A hurl will be banged off that table in a minute. Dan Shanahan, granite physique and expressive tattoos, strolls around the place like a man free. John Mullane is dancing inside and out, his eyes would cut you in two and his head is wired to […]

6 years ago

Today, is your day.

6 years ago

Young fella. No real idea. Straight out of school, Conor McKenna, the future of Eglish and of Tyrone, was snapped up. At the AFL draft, he lorded it and Essendon were all over him. Professional sport. Sunny Melbourne. All day long. Nobody in their right mind would think twice and McKenna, as an 18-year-old, completed […]

6 years ago

It’s the 20 day anniversary.

6 years ago

Let’s get ready to rumble.

6 years ago

So your father played for Dublin. Three All-Irelands, big reputation, biblical stories. He was some player. One of the best forwards they ever had. The fire is lit inside in you too, great to look back but better to look forward. The ball and the wall, he tells you, will go a long way. Days […]

6 years ago

The McGrath sisters are chomping at the bit. One to four, oldest to youngest. Club All-Ireland, re-invigorating taste. For five years, this Sarsfields team have been knocking on the door. For their whole lives, they’d been hearing stories from parents and grandparents, about the heady days of the ’90s, when the legendary last generation rose […]

6 years ago

Declan Darcy has been by Jim Gavin’s side since 2003. At the beginning of that year, the pair were informed by then Dublin manager Tommy Lyons that they wouldn’t be part of his Dublin panel for the year ahead. Lyons did have a proposition for the pair though, stressing that they should take on a […]

6 years ago

Today, is your day.

6 years ago

Out in China; there’s not a bother on James Cha Fitzpatrick. Happy out. Few online teaching classes here and there, eight weeks he’s been out of the class-room now. Happy out. In Shanxi, China, a hurler – a great hurler – swans around the place without a care in the world. Not many know about […]

6 years ago

Here we flippin’ go.

6 years ago

Darragh McElhinney is confident. And restless. Few laps of the Glengarriff GAA pitch, the one he’s played in since he was a kid. Then out the Caha Mountain road, ideal to break the monotony of boring short laps. McElhinney was a fine footballer, on the Cork development squads at 16. Loved it, too. Loop around and […]

6 years ago

Michael Carton has been winning battles all his life. On the field, the O’Tooles club man was the tigerish half back on one of Dublin’s best hurling teams. Half forwards were always in for a difficult day against Carton, with his bustling athleticism, his tight marking and his supremacy in the air. When Dublin won […]

6 years ago

Jack O’Shea never forgot the dreams he used have. Following out the band, standing for the parade, playing in an All-Ireland final. The stuff of fantasy. He won seven of them by the end of a decorated career but all the way through he never once forgot how lucky he was. And while some players […]

6 years ago

Let’s get ready to rumble…

6 years ago

When Eddie Brennan was hurling, the back door didn’t matter. Never in his illustrious 12 year career did Kilkenny win an All-Ireland without winning Leinster, and Brennan has eight All-Irelands. Every game must-win, Cody suffered no excuses and the safety net was duly, left to one side and ignored. Moving on, the skyline of the […]

6 years ago

A test of GAA, rugby, soccer with some tennis for good measure. It’s time for the SportsJOE 12 o’clock quiz. Best of luck.

6 years ago

The Irish government has cancelled all sporting events until April 19 at the earliest. As the country enters the most treacherous part of its battle against the corona-virus, An Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has on Tuesday announced some new, stringent measures to ensure our dealing with this pandemic in the safest and most effective way possible. […]

6 years ago

The games will never be the same again. So much pent-up audacity, hordes of newly acquired flicks, skills and tricks; nobody can wait for the games to recommence and when they do, there’s sure as heaven going to be a full blown revolution of bold, breath taking trick-plays. Maybe the little break will be no […]

6 years ago

The men for the big occasion. The Sunday Game on All-Ireland final day is an institution. The Team of the year, the three nominees for the man-of-the-match and of course, the debate and conjecture that follows. How good is your knowledge on All-Ireland hurling final man-of-the-match awards, stretching back to 2009? h

6 years ago

The hardest thing to believe, is that Richie Power wasn’t even expecting to start the game. Injuries. Jesus, Richie Power must have, at different stages throughout his career, wondered what on earth it was that he had done to suffer so much. But strap him like a mummy, tell him his chances were slim, reduce […]

6 years ago

You go into the dressing room to sit in the same seat, beside the same Johnny to talk about the same stretch in the evenings. We’re all creatures of habit and our old traditions, for commitment or laziness, die hard. You won’t survive in this manic GAA playing life without having a certain structure in […]

6 years ago

The games will return. It’s a terror, not being able to train collectively. As the rain dries up and the sun comes out, a quiet Friday evening grates on the mind even more, but there is no use in wanting what you can’t have. What you do have is time, time is money and these […]

6 years ago

An Ghaeltacht had the Ó Sé’s at their peak, Dara Ó Cinnéide on the edge of the square, they had one third of the Kerry senior team. Caltra were only a half-parish in east Galway without a county championship, never mind an All-Ireland club prior. Go figure. The 2003/2004 season was about breaking new ground […]

6 years ago

Liam Watson never did things the normal way. He was his own man, on the pitch and off it. Unapologetic for it. The man doesn’t regret a thing. “People say I was hard to manage, but when I was shown love, there’s not a better trainer than me. When managers didn’t treat me with respect, […]

6 years ago

It’s hard to believe that for a long time, All-Irelands were a far-fetched dream for Dublin. As a confident youngster, Alan Brogan didn’t see it that way. In college, he told Colm Parkinson that he had no worries about winning an All-Ireland because “Dublin have won an All-Ireland in every single decade since the GAA […]

6 years ago

Nobody knows when this black-out is going to end, but Limerick, Dublin and Galway county boards are already taking precautionary measures. There isn’t a person on this island who hasn’t been affected by the coronavirus and all its implications these last few weeks and while the spread of disease and the possible loss of life […]

6 years ago

The stories became fables. The A vs B games in Kilkenny training, became the stuff of legend. Jackie Tyrrell let the ordinary world in on this plain beyond reality in his thrill-a-minute autobiography, The Warrior’s Code. There were the stories of Cody and the lost whistle. The skelps, the fights, the kicks, the fact that this match […]

6 years ago

For years, Paul Townend was waiting on Ruby Walsh to make a mistake. The mistakes never came. It’s a lonely life, being the understudy of the greatest jockey ever to sit on a horse but Paul Townend bided his time and he kept the head down. There was no better place to be, than in […]

6 years ago

The highs and lows of horse-racing. One minute, Jamie Moore and Goshen were striding clear up Cleeve Hill, ready to soak in a famous Triumph Hurdle victory, having obliterated their rivals with a breath-taking performance. The next, jockey was on the floor and the riderless horse had stopped to a canter up the run in. […]

6 years ago

In Cheltenham, they’ve barely even mentioned a word. Ten years ago, this would have been heaven. Cheltenham week and all the excitement it brings…suddenly schools are off and the racing is a distant dream no more. It’s time for the bookie office, the old Morning Line, any podcast you can find, it’s the greatest week […]

6 years ago

Samcro, by a snot. For the fourth time in his eventful life, Melon has finished a bridesmaid at Cheltenham but there’s no shame in that and this, in the newly named Marsh Novice’s chase, was one hell of a competition. With all falling to ground around them, those of the equine game appear disinterested and […]

6 years ago

Ireland 3-0 Montenegro Five games unbeaten. The Irish women can do it behind closed doors too. There was an eerie feel to this Euro 2021 Group I qualifier against Montenegro in Petrovac, with each call and each shriek to be heard, loud and clear. But an atmosphere isn’t a requirement for the Irish women, as […]

6 years ago

Now you see me, now you don’t. Champ, from the foot of Cleeve hill is making a march. Minella Indo and Allaho have plenty in hand but Barry Graghty is bucking like a mad thing. Screw it, he’s not even in picture anymore. Not for long. Champ takes off like he’s only joined in. Champ, […]

6 years ago

“I could be in Wexford, Donegal, Limerick, Kilkenny…I live in Dublin” Then there’s the longest trip of all, the trip back west for training. It’s fair to say that Mayo senior footballer Stephen Coen doesn’t have a resting moment but a brief chat with the man lets you in on the secret; he doesn’t want […]

6 years ago

Speed will make the ground disappear but it won’t make defenders disappear. At inter-county level anyway, nine out of ten players will have moderate and surviving levels of pace. To get away from them then, attacking players will need something else, something elusive. Only John McGrath knows where he’s going to next. The ability to […]

6 years ago