Kieran McGeeney is the first manager in intercounty Gaelic football history to lose three Championship matches in the one summer. If you thought he was going to slink meekly into the shadows... well, then you don't know Geezer very well.
'The Sunday Game' did not even wait for full-time of the first of those Armagh defeats, to Cavan, before tearing into McGeeney. It was his arch nemesis Joe Brolly who led the assault at half-time.
"It's a mess, they're producing nothing," said Brolly. "What is the point of this? They swear allegiance to the cult of Kieran."
https://twitter.com/SportsJOEdotie/status/736948075420385284
On Tuesday, in the wake of the second qualifier defeat to Laois (and third in total), McGeeney struck back at Brolly and the other pundits who he accused of harking back to the halcyon days of their own playing careers, when every pass was a kick, every score was from play and every match-up was one-on-one and manly as hell.
“I would love to have been around at the games, I must have missed them, because the way they used to play, it must have been fantastic football,” said McGeeney.
“It was all kick passing, they were brave and courageous, their decision making was spot on and they never made mistakes. I must have missed that, those few games those boys played in."
Four years ago, when Dublin beat Donegal 8-6 in an All-Ireland semi-final, Brolly and Colm O'Rourke rounded on modern football - Brolly neglecting to dwell on Derry's defeat of Donegal on the exact same scoreline in a 1993 Ulster final. In fairness to the outspoken former corner-forward, it was not a game that would live long in the memory.
McGeeney drew attention to some of the scorelines from the 1990s and compared them to the totals being racked up today (Tyrone 5-18 Cavan 2-17, highest score in Ulster SFC history anyone?) as evidence that Brolly, O'Rourke and the rest of them did not play in some utopian age of football.
“Sometimes it mightn’t do any harm if some of our panelists and ex-footballers in the press took out the auld video recorder and shoved the tape in and had a look at themselves. They weren’t as good as they remember.”
Well, we don't have a Video Cassette Recorder (VCR) in the office (ask your folks) but we do have access to Youtube, so we took a gander at Brolly's greatest success - the 1993 All-Ireland final win over Cork.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIsiQxAMOXI
Granted it is the extended highlights, it is the biggest game of the year between the only two unbeaten teams in the land, two teams that have been forged in the white-hot heat of the Ulster championship and the, er, daisy field of the Munster championship, but we can still draw a few conclusions on the game 23 years ago.
These we have jotted down in no particular order.
- It's a wonder anyone could kick a ball at all given the number of heavy-duty knee supports on display. Both teams were littered with lads who would probably be sent out to the knacker's yard (or Santry Sports Clinic) if they were playing today.
- Some of the tackling (particularly in the run-up to Cork's early goal) was woeful, wishy-washy, ineffective half-hugging.
- Barry Coffey made amends late-on for the tackling cred of Gaelic football's showpiece with a vicious clothesline of Derry's Johnny McGurk.
- Enda Gormley's frees taken off the ground were a joy to behold and made us yearn for the days when more than far-from-home goalkeepers, Bryan Sheehan and Michael Murphy were practising that nearly-lost art.
- McGurk's opening point for Derry came at the end of a string of short handpasses that would have Brolly doing a pantomime jig in The Sunday Game studio.
- Brolly's first score came in the 25th minute.
- The pass from Don Davis (above, above everyone) to John O'Driscoll for Cork's second goal (11'30" in) should be on the Leaving Cert curriculum - if every kick pass in Brolly's day looked like that then he and O'Rourke and the rest would have a point.
- But they weren't. Loads of them were shite, just like lots of passes now are shite.
- Some of the hand-passing was shite too. Like Brolly's attempted fisted-point in the second half. He made a great run inside, down the endline and, with the chance of goal he instead fisted the ball against the post. From three yards. Tyrone forwards slated by Brolly for not taking goal chances against Kerry should take note.
Do as we say, not as we did...
