We’re surprised it didn’t show up with a big, red hand-print on it…
Playing GAA up along the Wild Atlantic Way can be a precarious past-time.
Pretty much nine months of the year are accompanied by weather warnings and playing on sodden pitches into sideways rain is a common occurrence.
There is also the matter, or danger, of putting the ball wide.
Back yourself to bisect the posts only to balloon one over the nets or skew one way, way wide and you could have cost your club an O’Neills.
Just about every club and county across the land will scrawl their name across balls as, heaven knows, they are right tough to come across. Some do it to prevent their balls getting pilfered by the opposition.
Up in Donegal, as All-Ireland winner Eamon McGee found out, there is another handy reason.
McGee shared an incredible picture, earlier today, that revealed the fate of one ball that his club had given up as lost.
Gweedore were lamenting the loss of four fresh balls, this week, when one was returned to them by a fisherman. The ball had apparently been discovered miles and miles off the Kilcar Coast and bobbing along in the North Atlantic.
https://twitter.com/EamonMcGee/status/863027581645455360
And there it is, in indelible blue in – Gaoth Dobhair (Gweedore).
Return to sender.
McGee’s post certainly elicited a response from some of GAA’s finest…
From what I remember that was one of you shots
— Éamonn Mac Fhionnghaile (@chest_86) May 12, 2017
think it was trying to be a ball bhouy. Boom
— Vinnie Murphy QFA (@Vinniedub14) May 12, 2017
Your defence was obviously all at sea 🌊
— Killeavy13 (@StevenMcD13) May 12, 2017
At least it ended up in the net
— Neil Loughran (@neil_loughran) May 12, 2017
Next time you see that club official approaching a new ball with a big, fat marker, now you’ll have a better understanding as to why.
