Class is permanent.
Ciaran McDonald is 47 years of age, has been out of the inter-county game for 15 years but his left leg hasn’t aged a day. Along with his Crossmolina Deel Rovers team-mates, McDonald played in a benefit game for Kieran Cawley on Saturday night when, predictably enough, he brought that old thing back.
The chance to see that famed left peg in action drew a big crowd to the air-dome in Bekan and even after all these years, McDonald didn’t disappoint. Luckily enough, there was a camera at the game between the 2001 All-Ireland club winning legends and the Irish Prison Service because, in an exhibition of passing and scoring, McDonald put on a show worth watching.
Sit back and enjoy two and a half minutes of genius as McDonald showed the touch and finesse we’ve always associated with him.
Kieran McDonald was back in action lastnight for a charity fundraising game for Kieran Cawley playing alongside his All-Ireland Club Champion team mates from 2001!! @MayoGAA @SecondCaptains @RefComeOn https://t.co/HkzJybuAZu
— CrossmolinaGAA (@DeelRoversGAA) January 30, 2022
It’s hardly surprising that, on his return to the Mayo camp as a coach, McDonald has dropped jaws whenever he’s decided to ping a few balls.
“You’d be doing a bit of practice with one fella, whether I’d be kicking a ball into him, and he’d take the ball off you and ping it in. You’d just feel that little bit inferior, because he still has it,” said Stephen Coen last year.
The game itself was in aid of a great cause as the football community rallied around Crossmolina native and local referee Kieran Cawley. Cawley was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer earlier this year with a Go Fund Me page set-up to finance his treatment.
