On a list of things worth dying for, Wexford hurling would not feature highly for me.
And I am a Wexford hurling fan.
Sure, I get depressed when they lose and elated when they win, I pine for 1996 like a lonesome labrador, consider recent Under-21 teams among the greatest entertainers since John Candy and recognise Martin Storey’s moustache as the eighth wonder of the world.
But I am not going to die for the cause.
Nor, we hope, will Davy Fitzgerald, but the county’s new hurling manager has admitted that exposing himself to the stresses and strains of intercounty management is not exactly advisable for a man who has twice undergone medical procedures on his heart.
Speaking at the launch of the Bord na Móna Leinster GAA Series (the Walsh and O’Byrne Cups to you and I), Fitzgerald admitted that returning to the sideline for Clare’s All-Ireland quarter-final defeat to Galway just a week after his latest procedure “wasn’t the best thing to do”.
“In the last few months, it has hit me a bit more, that this happened for the second time and when you have a blockage like that…and so what did I f**king do but go back for the f**king Galway game a week after having the blockage, like it probably wasn’t the best thing I did,” he told reporters.
“In saying that, if I was at home watching the match I’d actually be more … I’m actually way calmer when I’m there at the game and I’m in it, I’m grand, my mind is in a place and I’m fine.
“But if I’m at home I would be absolutely hopping off the wall there. So it was tough that time. But I didn’t think about it too much that week because there was so much going on. But in the weeks afterwards I did and it was one of the reasons going to Wexford that I was so 50/50 about doing it.”
Firstly, get that man on the next episode of ‘Celebrity Gogglebox’. Anyone who has witnessed Davy “I’ve got two All-Ireland medals, you’ve got fuck all” Fitzgerald on a sideline will be gobsmacked to hear he would be worse sat at home under doctor’s orders.
Secondly, and more importantly, if you are worried about the effect hurling is having on your health, why take a job managing one of the sport’s most infuriating teams? A job that entails a six-hour round-trip commute?
We have previously discussed the various routes from Clare to Wexford on The GAA Hour and none of them are great, and Fitzgerald says he leaves home at 2pm to arrive two hours ahead of a 7pm training session in Ferns and does not get back to Clare until 1am.
Which begs the question, why do it?
“The last few months, even in the darker months, the last month or two, it’s coming into my head, ‘Okay, what exactly happened you? You got a blockage. You don’t want to get one of them again because that could be fatal’. And it was me that copped it myself that time.
“I have, yeah (thought about it). But what is the story then? Do I just go home and sit down and put the feet up and just do nothing?”
Not our Davy, no chance. The man is simply stone mad for hurling.
Wexford welcomes you, Davy. You hurling lunatic.
Diarmuid Connolly makes his long overdue GAA Hour debut and talks to Colm Parkinson about everything from the black card to his rivalry with Lee Keegan and how he honed the ability to kick accurately with either foot.
