It Was Acceptable in the Eighties

As Eighties revivals go it was more Kajagoogoo's greatest hits than The Smiths reunion tour.

Less Gordon Gekko, more Roland Rat.

Not exactly The Breakfast Club, more TV-AM.

More Sinclair C5 than time-travelling DeLorean.

Yesterday's first All-Ireland semi-final between Cork and Meath demonstrated that, despite what the fashion press might tell us, vintage clothing doesn't look good on everyone. The fact that the lead-up to the game concentrated almost exclusively on dredging up frighteningly aged-looking members of those famous Cork and Meath teams of late 1980s and early 1990s meant that the modern version looked like a sanitised Disney remake in comparison.

Perhaps it was the deficiencies in the public profiles of the two teams that led to such a focus on the era of O'Rourke, Tompkins and co. For a team playing in its third All-Ireland semi-final in a row, this Cork side remain possibly the most strangely anonymous bunch to make a Sam Maguire decider in recent memory.

Perhaps this is due to the tameness of their departures back down the N7 after their recent visits to the capital; the fact that they haven't contributed to a single memorable game in HQ in an era full of them.

It doesn't help them that they (the county's footballers) have, for the last decade, laboured in the shadow cast by their infinitely more successful and charismatic hurling counterparts. Following on from that, the paltry attendance, and resulting flat atmosphere, at Croke Park yesterday cannot have been helped by wallet-fatigue in the county, being the fourth game the hurlers and footballers have played in Dublin over the past three weeks.

Meath, while receiving the garlands of back-slappers like myself for their impressive displays up until yesterday, have also been relative strangers to the front rows of the public consciousness of late, although they did boast, in Graham Geraghty, Darren Fay and Anthony Moyles, some refugees from their last excursions in the big time.

But hey, all that aside, you couldn't blame the meeja for dusting down the archives for the historical perspective on this game, certainly when you got a few glimpses of the action from 1987 and 1988 in particular. Des Cahill's perambulations around the country for The Road to Croker took him to Ratoath last week, a show which featured delicious slices from the ripe old rivalry of that time.

You'd almost have put your hands over the children's eyes such was the extremity of the violence on show. The next time a Heated Debate erupts over the issue of clouting and schemozzling in the GAA, a perspective-inducing viewing of the tape from the 1988 All-Ireland final replay should be insisted on. Quite honestly, today's game is like rhythmic gymnastics in comparison.

Regardless of the harsh light of history or the echoing buttresses of a half-empty Croke Park, yesterday's semi-final was a disappointing affair in itself. None of the responsibility for that rests with Cork, however, who absolutely destroyed Meath, dominating every blade of grass and all the key areas with embarassing ease.

Hopefully now the likes of Nicholas Murphy, Derek Kavanagh, Donnacha O'Connor, Kevin McMahon and Pearse O'Neill will emerge into the limelight their hurling brethren have long enjoyed, and in which their historical predecessors once revelled.

My Secret Meath Shame

I have an embarassing admission to make. Rather like the son of landed gentry who has taken up with one of the servant girls, I'm in the midst of an utterly inappropriate infatuation.

This Meath team, well, Papa, you see the thing is I'm afraid I've rather fallen for them. I know it's wrong, and it goes against the very laws of nature, and no good can possibly come of it. But our eyes met across a crowded stadium and, gosh, I was captivated.

Pretty much since that drawn Leinster quarter-final game with Dublin announced them as rosy-cheeked debutantes on the summer season, they've drawn plenty of admiring glances. For me, it was the invigorating directness, the liberating absence of complexity, the can-do gumption that did it.

Since then they've only gotten better, and the defeat of Tyrone on Saturday would make a Dub swoon, so full was it of heart and skill and countless almost-lost Gaelic football attributes.

Is it so wrong to love this Meath team?

The doctrine of Colm Coyle's All-Ireland semi-finalists (for the first time since 2001) is so blindingly straightforward as to create the image of countless rival inter-county managers smacking their foreheads in self-chastising disbelief that they hadn't thought of it before.

Firstly, populate the spine of the team with experienced but still hungry old heads. Brendan Murphy (the one-time-Premiership goalkeeper), Darren Fay, Nigel Crawford, Anthony Moyles and Graham Geraghty bring the know-how. Then surround them with a group of youngsters oozing fresh-faced chutzpah.

Then - and this is the best bit - larrup in the ball to your forwards whenever you have it, trusting them to win it and score, and seeing them grow through the sheer fact of being empowered to do so. See how Stephen Bray, Brian Farrell and Shane O'Rourke begin to inhabit the Croke Park manor over which their predecessors once lorded.

This current infatuation has nothing to do with seeing one of the old heroes of one's boyhood restored to former glory. No, while Meath were one of the big shots of the late 1980s and early 1990s, no-one actually liked them. They were rough and tough and mean and lean and they wouldn't have had the poets of the press box reaching for the Book of Heavenly Metaphors.

No, there isn't really any residual goodwill for the county; and I can't remember many shaken-headed conversations in recent years in which Meath's rehabiliation was yearned for.

So it's caught me by surprise, this feeling of excitement for the next time I see them play. I haven't felt like this for some time, you see!

They're Back!

Quite clearly, they haven't gone away, you know.

The biennial spectacle of Tyrone's footballers in full, voracious flow continues. Whatever it is that they do during those even years when they virtually disappear, they should market it to burned-out executives as the perfect rejuvenation therapy. Maybe they signed some sort of pact with the devil, which, along with having to give the Dark Lord's son a regular game at right corner-back, means their particular brand of footballing devastation can only be deployed every second year.

Whatever, they're back now and that's that. Deal with it.

Mickey Harte's responses to post-match questions used that formula that the Tyrone manager swears by: for howsoever fantastic my team are, I will be proportionally humble. "We have to be very careful here, because we weren't a great team coming into this game so we're no world beaters now," Harte protested, codding no-one.

Now, in the all-time list of abject Donegal performances in the Ulster Championship, yesterday's effort will jostle its way among the many other contenders near the top. All the same, this particular Clones cyclone blew Tír Conaill away to such an extent that the county's supporters' scornful words should have stopped in their throats, to be replaced with acknowledgements of the their opponents' incontestable class.

That Donegal are a team who are operating to some arcane alternative calendar which fooled them into thinking that you must play your best football in February is only a side-issue.

Tyrone's relentless support running, intelligent movement and fierce competition for possession were the matters that should have engaged football's chattering classes in the aftermath of yesterday's game. The performance of Brian Dooher alone will send shudders around the nation.

That they threw in a scatter of horrendous wides is of little consolation to prospective victims, given that one Stephen O'Neill joined in for the final twenty-odd minutes, blowing off the cobwebs with two points.

******

Events in Clones and the return of the Red Hand will engage the GAA's great minds and strategists, but Thurles was the place to be for less sober-minded pursuits. The residents of the Tipperary town can't have seen a weekend like it since the days of Féile. Even the Stunning and the Saw Doctors put together couldn't have generated the decibel levels and general high-octane excitement of two games that provided yet another reminder of the unique magic of Munster Championship hurling.

Quite what to expect when Limerick and Tipperary do it all over again on Saturday is impossible to know. On the face of it Limerick have simply trailed Tipp like a particularly enthusiastic puppy: every time Tipp have tried to shoo them away, Limerick have scampered happily back to their heel. Will Tipp finally rid themselves of the troublesome mutt, or will Limerick eventually bite them on the bum?

If that metaphor is too fluffy to fit the slash and gurn of Munster hurling, then happily Cork and Waterford's canine likenesses tend more towards brawling pit-bulls. Waterford got their third win over Cork this year, and will be hoping that the habit remains unbreakable.

But the loss of the suspended Cusack, ó hAilpín and O'Sullivan for such a game would have felt for Cork like one of those anxiety dreams where you go into a job interview with no trousers on. Add in a sense of grievance over the suspensions that the Rebels can place neatly on their shoulders alongside the chips that reside there already, and Waterford's mood this morning will be a cautious sort of elation.

******

Cautious elation is rarely the prevailing mood of Dublin supporters when they are cheering their team home to victory against Meath. But most will be aware that pulling away from a doughty Meath side late on is not quite the push-start for the Dubs summer juggernaut. However, the amount of criticism that Dublin get when things go poorly dictates that, in the interests of fairness, if not human decency, they should get some credit for the win.

They did manage - just about - to avert another backslide from a winning position, which they'll hope represents the end of that particular pesky foible.

And there were a few more of those long-sought answers to longer-extant questions. Ross McConnell has improved exponentially in the full-back role for one thing. Mark Vaughan is a very Dublin type of darling, but he kicked frees satisfactorily, and, more importantly, showed a lot of character in that period where Dublin's familiar fade began to reappear. Importantly, he never provided any other message to his team-mates than "give me the ball", an enthusiasm which eventually lit the touchpaper for the Dubs win.

An Offaly team at leisure while Dublin have been at war await on Sunday, so caution is justified - not that it will last that long, mind you.

Definitely Not 'Grand Slam Weekend' Ok?

One of the most familiar complaints of we compliant, huddled masses as we are force-fed our Premiership staple is not so much the content, but rather the packaging. Does the world's most exciting league need to be wrapped in so many sparkly labels telling us so? This weekend's instalment of the GAA Championships provides an interesting case study in the value of the organic, wholefood approach to sports marketing.

Essentially, had the sharp-suited gents in the Sky Sports marketing department got hold of the Championship weekend ahead, there would not be an event short of the Second Coming itself (no, not Price Naseem's return to the ring, the actual one) subject to so much drooling anticipation.

As it is, the mouthwatering program on Saturday and Sunday stands by itself and, soberly noted in the GAA fixture list and the RTE television schedules, looks none the less exciting for not being called 'Weekend of the Titans' or somesuch.

Hell, the GAA even languidly muttered "bovvered?" at the prospect of the Dublin v Meath replay not being on the telly, until the unsatisfactory fudge was reached of having it run against the just as eagerly anticipated Cork v Waterford battle on either side of RTE's channel portfolio. It's an unfortunate circumstance, as one imagines the neutral public will veer towards the low-brow entertainment at Croke Park rather than the high art on display in Thurles (and with my purist kudos now secured, I will secretly don my Beer Helmet and join them).

The weekend's main features divide into two distinct categories: on one hand, both codes see proven recent champions (Cork, Tyrone) take on hungry and in-form contenders (Waterford, Donegal); on the other, two stonking drawn games throw up replays between teams whose bitter local rivalries guarantees zest, but whose ultimate All-Ireland credentials are questionable at best (Limerick v Tipperary, Dublin v Meath).

There's no harm in expending a little hot air at this time of the year on the timeless battle of Leinster's big two, there being space in the early Championship rounds for a bit of hype. The press have passed the time between the drawn game and the announcement of the teams with the traditional tireless deployment of the word "bonanza" in relation to the ringing of the GAA's tills ahead of Sunday's replay. I saw the word so many times I thought Lorne Greene and Michael Landon had been called in to shore up Dublin's troublesome full-back line.

Meath won a lot of friends in that first game, which is an unusual thing to say about teams from that county. Their brand of old-fashioned, give-it-long football was so refreshingly retro that I half expected The Sunday Game to be followed by an episode of Murphy's Micro Quizm. They have firepower as well, which will be augmented by the return of their NFL top scorer Brian Farrell. If they eliminate their poor starts to each half they could spell the demise of another sad, sullen Dublin team.

Cork and Waterford's duels in recent years have been some of the most transfixing in GAA, from the 2003 Munster final, through the classic 2004 version to the damp but thrilling denouement to last year's All-Ireland semi. There has been little between them in that time, and as much epic heroism as any Norse saga. The momentum is with Waterford and a look of steel that won them the league final tips the edge in their direction.

Conversely with Limerick and Tipperary, although the Shannonsiders finished in bravura fashion last weekend, Tipp retain a smidgeon of extra class, evident in the fact that their scores seemed easier crafted than Limerick's, whose effort expended in getting the draw could leave them flat tomorrow evening.

Finally (apologies to Sligo, Roscommon, Louth and Wexford, but you know how it is, pressures of space etc.) to the second test of Donegal's credentials, Tyrone. Armagh were negotiated in a manner about as unconvincing as a performance could be and still be a victory.

Which, for Donegal, could turn out to be a very good thing. Had they breezed past the Orchard county in rip-roaring style, they would have already been subconsciously booking Dublin hotel rooms for September. Now, with a very grave reminder of their own fallibility fresh in their minds, they can apply themselves studiously to a weary-looking Tyrone, a team that, for all their greater achievements, do not petrify Donegal like Armagh do.

And there you have it: a weekend heaving with the promise of pulsating drama, and not a hairy-handed host nor a gravelly-voiced Scotsman in sight.

Get That Man a Dub-ble

Alcoholic narcolepsy, that's my diagnosis.

Classic case, judging by the symptoms of Dublin's football team on Sunday. You know the type: the fellow slumped unconscious at the bar, the drool on his chin dangling perilously over the dregs in his glass, who suddenly, as if someone had inserted a coin into a slot in his back, wakes up and begins a tour de force of bar-room bonhomie.

Barmaids are reluctantly waltzed around the premises, outrageous stories involving stowing away in a merchant ship bound for the Barbary Coast are breathlessly told, a stirring rebel ballad is crooned, then........slump, back to boozy slumber. And the barkeep doesn't mind so much because, "sure he's nowhere else to go".

Yes alcoholic narcolepsy, clearly. The ball is thrown in at Croke Park and Dublin are all tall tales and ripping yarns, devastating wit and blustery banter. Five points up and the craic is ninety. Shane Ryan punches the air as if to give us a blast of Sean South from Garryowen, then.....slump...zzzzzzzzz...

Meanwhile, with Dublin dreaming of the time they and Brendan Behan robbed barrels of porter from Guinness's yard, Meath quietly went about the business of cleaning up the mess - righting upturned barstools, placating the irate barmaid ("I'm telling ya, I've had enough of him"), wiping down the counter. Then the Dubs are up again, full of the joys, lucid and engaging; the goal comes, a few more points...slump....snorrrrrre...

And so on and so forth.

It often happens in Gaelic football that - even in the most well-matched contests - matches are broken into chapters of domination, rather than having a simple, metronomic or 'end-to-end' flow. It is difficult to pin-point why this happens. Is it because, having gotten a score, the attacking side have an advantage with the ensuing kickout, due to their ball-winners being able to 'run onto' the arriving clearance, whereas the defending team must change direction in order to launch a retaliatory attack?

Or is it purely a psychological domino effect? Does the effect of getting a score release endorphins in the attacking side that inspire them to outperform their opponents over the next several sequences of play, until the momentum eventually dwindles and the initiative swings the other way?

Perhaps it is just the nature of the sport: that a game which demands such wholehearted collective commitment requires a breather every now and then.

Whatever causes it, there is no team that exemplify this phenomenon quite like Dublin. When they're good, they're very, very good, and when they're bad, they're horrid. The psychological explanation is quite persuasive in the case of the Dubs in Croke Park, given that, when they are on top, the force of positivity from the majority of the massive crowd is like a massive shot of adrenalin.

Conversely, when that force is inverted, and the team are struggling, it must seem an oppressive burden.

We could go on about the lack of leadership, the problems at full-back and with free-taking, the flaws that remain stubbornly with this Dublin team like ill-advised tattoos, and mean that they seem destined for another year of frustration. That still doesn't explain the explosions of virtuosity they can produce, then follow up with the flattest bum notes.

Alcoholic narcolepsy, it has to be.

"Did I ever tell you about the time I won the All-Ireland.....a nayshun onnnnnce again!.....Hic!....zzzzzzzzzzzzz"

A Rivalry That Transcends Patio Decking

Surely the rivalry between Dublin and Meath ain't what it used to be? I mean, don't most Dubs now actually live in Meath, and most Meath folk work in Dublin? And with Leinster's current status as a second rate football province, surely the meetings of the two counties aren't the do-or-die affairs of old?

Not likely!! (CUE BLUR'S "SONG 2" ACCOMPANIED BY EXPLOSIVE FOOTAGE OF DUBLIN AND MEATH MATCHES FEATURING PLAYERS KICKING THE BEJESUS OUT OF EACH OTHER)

Woo-hoo indeed. Okay, maybe the classic lines have been blurred a little of late, the Urban v Rural conflict being diluted by commuter belt sprawl into a rather less timeless Suburban v Suburban duel. And yes, where once the winners of Leinster wiped the blood from their fists, spat out a loosened tooth or two and headed forth toward a likely All-Ireland final, this era hasn't seen a national finalist from the province since Meath's dismal appearance in the 2001 decider.

Still, it's Dublin v Meath isn't it? It is a Classic Sporting Rivalry. It remains compelling, despite the devaluation of mediocrity and cultural homogenisation, for the following reasons:

1. 1991 and all that
The four game Leinster Championship series between the counties was of such seismic importance that it caused the final collapse of the Soviet Union. Not really, but, according to those who like to throw a bit of historical revisionism into their match-reports, it did save the GAA.

Apparently, so the story goes, back in the summer of 1991 the whole lot of us had cast away all that was good and proper about our sporting heritage and taken up with this new "soccer" craze. The pubs and clubs resounded to the strains of "Olé Olé" and dyed-in-the-wool Gah-men liked nothing better than to sport a pair of Gazza-style fake boobs. All over the country juvenile Gaelic football coaches were driven demented urging kids to "pick it up".

Then came that Dublin-Meath series and suddenly the nation turned back toward the path of righteousness, remembering that epic tales of tumultuous struggle were not solely the preserve of foreign fields, and we all lived happily ever after.

But if that lot's a bit rich for your blood, suffice it to say that as far as the Dublin-Meath rivalry goes, those matches will resonate for as long as the two counties play the game.

2. Here Comes the Summer
Like the last meeting of the sides two years ago, this year's version comes early in the summer - and on the June bank holiday weekend at that. For all that the opening weeks of the Championship have seen some intriguing encounters, a few surprises and much to talk about, there really is nothing like the earth-shaking energy of a full Croke Park to signal the proper commencement of hostilities.

Dublin v Meath is one of the few fixtures that can provide the Big Event this early in the summer, and as such, fuelled by the boozy bank holiday buzz, Croker will be ablaze come Sunday.

3. It Just Is!
Sometimes, the look of a match gives it extra appeal. A huge baying crowd, for example. Burly, aggressive protagonists. Or the colours of the jerseys. It's a brilliant contrast, the sky-blue and navy against the green and gold. It just works.

We're simple enough creatures at the end of it all, for all our compooters and personal stereo machines. We're susceptible to suggestion. Subconsciously, when we watch Dublin-Meath (or Dublin-Kerry, or Celtic-Rangers, or Barcelona-Real), the little kid inside goes "oooh, they must really not like each other, they're dressed TOTALLY differently!"

It helps to keep a good rivalry bubbling when differences are underlined. Thankfully, despite the flow from tenement grime on one hand, and cattle husbandry on the other, towards a patio-decked middle ground, the Sky-blue and Navy and the Green and Gold will always provide a healthy reminder of that county border.