Spreading a little joy and happiness

It’s almost compulsory to diss the All Star awards, so it’s doubtful whether the people who select the winners would be moved by any praise at all, let alone from a lone(ly) Déise-serving blogger. Still, it needs to be said: they did good this year. Giving an award to John Mullane was a no-brainer, but there was always going to be scope for leaving out Michael Walsh, an attitude that yerra, Waterford have already won one they’d better not get notions above their station – this despite Walsh being even more deserving than Mullane on the basis of performances. So no complaints from Waterford or Galway, or Dublin even where they must view Alan McCrabbe’s gong as increasing evidence of the progress in the game. In fact, the most moaning will be from Tipperary, where four awards from thirteen nominations will have echoes of Waterford’s angst over our 1-from-10 return in 1998. Then there is Kilkenny, where every slight is nurtured with Homeric zeal. Only six All Stars. Expect Cody to use that as a rallying call as they go for the five-in-a-row.

Top heavy Stars

It’s a sign of how far Waterford have come over the last decade that I can manage to be a little disappointed at the amount of nominations we received for the 2009 All Stars. This philosophy of stuffing the nominations with nearly everyone who played in the All-Ireland final then filling the gaps with a handful of AN Other’s is enough to give you a dose of gas. Thirteen nominations for Tipperary? Why didn’t they just go the whole hog and give one to Benny Dunne?

Having said that, it’s hard to argue with an All-Ireland final that was for the ages. And nominations are really only worthwhile to players who have never had a nomination, so Noel Connors should be pleased at the national recognition. For the rest of them,  Clinton Hennessy and Tony Browne will be under no illusions. Hennessy’s chances, slim enough to begin with, would have been snuffed out by PJ Ryan’s match-winning performance in the All-Ireland final. And Tony Browne will probably look on it as a lifetime achievement nomination. Don’t expect to see him anywhere other than Waterford on the big night.

Which leaves two men standing. John Mullane is a lock. Guilt about his being overlooked last year should override any concerns about his wild performance in the semi-final against Kilkenny. He might even get Hurler of the Year, what with the whiff of sulphur that is lingering around Tommy Walsh (which means Lar Corbett will probably win it, but we can hope).

The only likely variable then is the fate of Michael Walsh. I’ve learned over the years not to look for conspiracy theories, not to see slights on Waterford where there are none – I was being sincere in the previous post when saying that Brian Corcoran was entitled to his opinion, however crass and hurtful it might be. But should Walsh, in spite of a string of stupendous performances,  be squeezed out by the need to garland the All-Ireland finalists further, one will be rather vexed.

Full list of nominations here.

It could have been worse

7 August 2005. The second Ashes test is reaching its climax. Australia have made an improbable 103 runs from the eighth and ninth wickets to go only two runs short of victory, one that would have left them 2-0 up with three to play in the series. Steve Harmison bowls an unplayable ball that hits Michael Kasprowicz on the glove and loops into the grateful hands of wicketkeeper Geraint Jones. Up goes Billy Bowden’s finger and Edgbaston erupts. England have won the most nailbiting of test matches. I must confess to shrieking like the Bibe. Sporting victories are rarely so satisfying – or defeat so sickening.

Half an hour later, Channel 4’s Simon Hughes threatened to put a damper on things. As the ball speared up towards his face, Kasprowicz had taken his glove off the bat. In a nutshell, he wasn’t out. Bowden, the archetypal lookatmelookatmelookatme official, had gotten it wrong. Yet there were few (if any) complaints from the Australians. It had looked out, to the point that even Kasprowicz didn’t quibble. Anyone else in Bowden’s position would have been justified in lifting the finger.

That incident came to mind after last Sunday’s tremendous All-Ireland final. On the face of it, the match turned on a decision by referee Diarmuid Kirwan, awarding that penalty to Kilkenny. Could Kirwan use the defence that I’ve described above for Bowden? You’ll have the usual hysterical Cats saying it was a penalty, but when you break it down this doesn’t stand up to scrutiny. You could argue that Richie Power was being fouled and the ref was playing advantage until he stepped into the penalty area, but just because you are being fouled doesn’t allow you to foul the ball by taking nine to ten steps. We need refs to have the cojones to give big decisions, but come on Mr Kirwan, there was a perfectly reasonable halfway house – give the free back where the original offence took place. Kilkenny fans may argue Henry Shefflin would have rattled it home anyway, but given his lame effort against us in the semi-final I’m not convinced Shefflin is that kind of deadball goal scorer in the manner of Paul Flynn or DJ Carey, and there would have been extra bodies on the line. It wasn’t a great decision, one made all the worse by the presence of an admittedly cowardly alternative.

For all of that, Kirwan got one big decision right, one that for me had a more decisive bearing on the game: the sending off of Benny Dunne. It might seem odd to label this a good decision seeing as it was so obviously a red card offence but referees seem reluctant to send players off in All-Ireland finals – Eamonn Scallan in 1996 is the only other example of it in the last fifty years – probably for fear of being accused afterwards of ‘ruining the game’. You only have to look at the way Terje Hauge ended up questioning his correct decision to send off Jens Lehmann in the 2006 European Cup final to see how pressure to keep the contest in a final can influence a ref. Credit to Diarmuid Kirwan then for doing the right thing, and it would prove decisive. In a tight, high octane match played in energy-sapping conditions, it’s hard to see how Tipp could have kept Kilkenny at bay for the full 70 while a man down. The penalty definitely helped, but ultimately that wild pull would prove to be Tipp’s undoing.

And what an undoing. Can you imagine if it had been Waterford in that position? Never mind stewards to prevent a pitch invasion, they would have needed a cordon to prevent people flinging themselves from the upper tiers of the stands. Tipperary people might have been slightly more mellow than us, seeing as they can be confident of another few cracks in the near future whereas we always feel we have to take our chances when they come. But the manner of the defeat was as hurtful as it gets. My wife routinely rails against the frightening intensity of the hurling championship, how whole seasons can be destroyed in a whirlwind of ash. Neutrals justifiably are thrilled by it, and it does make victory all the sweeter. But it’s scary how we as supporters put so much of our sense of wellbeing into something so capricious, so completely beyond our control. Better to lose by 23 points and be done with it than endure what Tipp fans went through last Sunday.

The politics of envy

It’s that time of year again – deciding who we would least hate to see winning the Liam McCarthy Cup. For years, it was a simple task to parse my desires regarding the destination of the All-Ireland. Waterford would go out with barely a whimper, so allegiances would swiftly switch to Cork. After that would come the Munster champions, which would usually mean Tipperary – at this stage Tipp would have been the famine-struck losers rather than the Hell’s Kitchen ogres of yore, so it was easy to run up the Munster flag of convenience. Then it would be anyone but Galway.

Simpler times, because then Waterford became competitive which complicated the overall All-Ireland picture. This would be best illustrated by the crushing nature of the defeat to Clare in 1998 which meant that it would be anyone but the Banner boyz for the best part of a decade – I’m happy to report that my gut reaction to being told of their victory in the Under-21 semi-final was one of delight – and each year would present a new set of slights with which to get wound up. This was best illustrated in 2007, when we had the first Come on the Déise edition of this annual game. Despite not feeling any inherent animosity towards Limerick, and no resentment at the manner in which they scuppered our own All-Ireland dreams, I still couldn’t bring myself to root for David over Goliath.

Last year saw a hiatus in this particular routine but it’s back for 2009, and the question is: Kilkenny or Tipperary? The unique selling point of last year’s final was Waterford’s presence in it. This year it’s Kilkenny’s quest for four All-Ireland’s in a row, the first time since Cork in 1944 that a team in the final are chasing that target. On balance, I’d rather see this happen than not happen. While having one team dominate a sport is generally seen as being malign, there is some logic to the school of thought that revels in the presence of excellence. Plenty of people root for Tiger Woods and Roger Federer. In addition, to see Kilkenny crush all before them would make Waterford’s shortcomings in recent years feel less acute – we would all be labouring under the burden of toppling a team that, with Cork having not won Munster in 1941,  could objectively claim to be the best of all time.

Then there’s Tipperary fans, or more specifically the yahoos who drunkenly accosted me after this year’s Munster final to slobber their appreciation that we had shown up but yerra what chance could ye have being from Waterford. The famine years may have put manners on Tipperary fans at the time but the sense of entitlement didn’t take long in reasserting itself. Perhaps one shouldn’t be too hard on an entire county based on the behaviour of a couple of morons – they were magnificence itself when we won the Munster title in 2002 – but when looking for reasons to split the difference between the two on Sunday, I can think of worse reasons than having that pair being brought down a peg or three.

Still, having put forward the contrary argument the time has come to admit to wanting Tipp to win on Sunday, and this is why: the need to puncture Kilkenny’s veneer of invincibility. When Cork were chasing three-in-a-row in 2006, it seemed nothing could knock them out of their stride. Roy Keane had the chutzpah to encourage them to think of five-in-a-row, the kind of talk that if uttered by the likes of Mick McCarthy would be ridiculed by Roy’s acolytes as being presumptuous. But they were knocked out of their stride, and to an extent that they haven’t been able to summon up the rage for another proper tilt at the title since. If Kilkenny win on Sunday, you can be sure all and sundry will be back in training at the first opportunity to try for something that no senior team has ever accomplished in either hurling or football. If they lose, more than a few people will lose the will to try and rebuild the x-in-a-row house again from scratch.  It might be too much to ask for Brian Cody to be one of those people, but you can always hope.

And it is with that hope in my heart that I will be cheering for Tipperary on Sunday.

Seeing the Forristal for the trees

A few years back I was in my local Garda station completing the documentation for a passport renewal. The guard on duty recognised my name (he knows my old fella) and a brief chat ensued about matters hurling. The guard, a native of Mooncoin, noted how his son was trying to get on to the Kilkenny Under-14 panel for the upcoming Tony Forristal tournament – along with over a hundred others. So while it’s always important to add the caveat that one shouldn’t read too much in to performances at underage level, that’s not to say that no one takes it seriously. Good vibes then from the Tony Forristal tournament in Waterford last weekend where the B team won the Sonny Walsh tournament and the A team lost in the final to Tipperary. There’ll probably be street parties down in Wexford as they managed to beat the Cats. Results breakdown here.

Semi-final non-draw

There’s been much confusion online since the weekend as to how the semi-final pairings for the Senior All-Ireland (nice to have to make the distinction from how the Minor All-Ireland will work) will be decided. The GAA have nipped all speculation in the bud:

Depending on the winners of next weekend’s quarter-finals, the semi-final pairings will be as follows:

- If Limerick and Galway win (both provincial runners-up are eliminated, Galway previously played Kilkenny), then the semi-finals are Kilkenny v Limerick and Tipperary v Galway.

- If Dublin and Waterford win (both provincial runners-up), then the semi-finals are Kilkenny v Waterford and Tipperary v Dublin

- If Dublin and Galway win (Dublin are provincial runners-up), then the semi-finals are Kilkenny v Galway and Tipperary v Dublin

- If Limerick and Waterford win (Waterford are provincial runners-up), then the semi-finals are Kilkenny v Waterford and Tipperary v Limerick

(H/t to johnnycool and De Paper)

The logic is impeccable. Provincial finalists can not meet. If the quarter-finals throw up two teams who one of the provincial champions have already played (e.g. Dublin and Galway, or Waterford and an imaginary Clare) then those champions play the team they played earliest in the championship. It’s just a pity that this rationale had not been applied in 2007 when we would have ended up playing Wexford in the semi-final rather than Limerick. Then again, maybe it’s just as well; contriving to lose to Wexford might have been too much for our fragile egos.

Let’s party like it’s 1992

The Waterford Under-21’s kept the show on the road with a thumping win over Tipperary in Dungarvan on Thursday. The parallels with 1992 are spooky; the Minors beat Tipperary back then and the Under-21’s played Clare in the Munster decider. Let’s hope these parallels carry through. And surely Maurice Shanahan has to get a chance at Senior level now?

Final to be played Wednesday 29 July, venue TBC.

Waterford 2-16 (22) Tipperary 4-14 (26)

The effect of any sporting result isn’t just measured in the final result itself. The tea-leaf reading that will attach itself to England’s draw with Australia yesterday in the first Ashes test demonstrates this. England can be justifiably euphoric at how they repelled a certain Australian victory with a pair of batting bunnies. On the other hand, once the sickening feeling subsides at not producing the one ball in sixty-nine attempts that was needed to remove either James Anderson or Monty Panesar – and it was really sickening for the convicts when you put it in those terms – Australia will know they are better than England, sufficiently so that they can look forward to the next four matches with a spring in their step.

So what can Waterford take from losing the Munster final to Tipperary? There’s self-evidently no pleasure in the result and, as I will allude to in the next thousand or so rambling words, it wasn’t that great a performance. Only two of the starting forwards scored from play and some of the flubs in the back division were painful to behold. There was pleasure in the way the players held their nerve in the second half when it looked like a dam was about to burst over their heads. It’s a step backwards over recent years when respectable defeats become an end in itself but sitting as I was beside my eldest brother, a veteran of the 1989 Munster final humiliation, it wasn’t difficult to extract some succour from that element of the performance.

And it was with my brother that the maximum amount of entertainment was wrung out of the day, to whit: what would Michael Duignan make of such a display if disrespect by X/Y/Z from Waterford? Hence when the minors ran around Thurles with the cup just as the torch to commemorate the 125th anniversary of the establishment of the Association arrived on the scene, we chortled at imagining Duignan’s outrage, how Michael Cusack would be spinning in his grave at such fist-pumping and playing to the gallery. The fact that Duignan would not have been at a microphone at that point was neither here nor there, it was the creativity in creating his fury that mattered.

Then again, had MD been in the booth he might well have been struck dumb by the performance of the Waterford minors. I carried little hope into the game of anything other than a fearsome beating from the always-formidable Tipperary. We arrived a few minutes after throw-in, none the worse for wear for daring to dress like it was the middle of July then getting caught in a thunderstorm, and were pleased to see that scores were level. We then watched with increasing incredulity as Waterford slowly edged away. There were no purple patches where they rattled over 2-5 to kill the game. Nor were Tipp so toothless that they could be said to have played badly. Twice they bore down on goal only to brilliantly denied by Stephen O’Keeffe. Speaking as we were about performance and result this was perfect, and great credit reflects on everyone involved (including Michael Walsh, no less a figure than the Waterford City Manager; what a splendid way of demonstrating the egalitarian nature of the GAA, to see a person who has flown so high taking on such a lowly position. Some fat cat.)

I’m not plugged in to the pulse of the Déise nation nor ever claim to be, so I don’t see it as a sign of being an inadequate Déisigh to not know how well the Minors are coming along.  So a story I overheard in work this time last year that I dismissed at the time as so much straw-clutching now makes sense. A former Waterford senior hurler was relaying to a fellow colleague the details of the minors implosion at the hands of Cork in Walsh Park. He thought there was real talent in the team, but the coach insisted on having a two-hour training session on the afternoon of the game. Duly Waterford kept pace with Cork until the final quarter when they fell apart. Watching the Minors yesterday filled me with hope for the future. I’ve banged the drum online for our future on the basis of the efforts of the likes of De La Salle in colleges hurling and the Tony Forristal team. All along though I was worried that I was engaging in wishful thinking, extrapolating on the basis of something that I hadn’t experienced for myself. Now, I have seen and I believe.

(This is probably more wishful thinking, but it was great to be so uplifted. Whatever happens in the future, I’ll settle for that.)

On to the main event then, fears that the minors may be a source of depression to the seniors well and truly extinguished. The ball was thrown in, it went straight up the field to John Mullane who opted to shoot from a narrow angle when he had plenty of time to create a better chance – and the ball flew straight over the bar. Clearly in the mood then. Points were exchanged with Brendan Cummins pulling off a fantastic save from Eoin Kelly before Waterford managed to score from a free to take away the sour taste of that save / miss. Mullane was then fouled close in and Kelly teed up the free. The two wise men right at the far end of the Old Stand agreed that he should just knock the ball over the bar, and had we had a preview of the daisy-cutter he sent towards goal we’d have been right. Except Brendan the Great let the ball squirm under his hurley and Waterford had leapt four points clear. Great stuff, but it wouldn’t be long before Tipp made it look like a buffer against the inevitable hammering. It might have been the wind but Waterford were soon struggling to cope, Clinton Hennessy having to pull off a fine save from his own, although Waterford failed to take full advantage of that let-off with Tipp scoring from the clearance – an event that would sadly define the day.

Tipperary edged closer then ahead, their dominance illuminated by a splendid catch-run-and-score point from Shane McGrath. Waterford were struggling to get any ball up to the forwards so it was just as well that Mullane had brought his Superman boots, roaring on to a breaking ball and flashing the ball to the net. Incredibly Waterford were ahead despite living off scraps and it was all down to Mullane. His cat-like agility is truly extraordinary. At one point in the second half he went down in a heap trying to catch a Waterford puckout. Surrounded by three Tipp players, you worried how he’d get the ball out of harm’s way. Yet in the time it took to think that thought he was on his feet and galloping in the direction of Cummins’ goal. He scored 1-5 on the day, and it would be an interesting exercise to see how many of Eoin Kelly’s 1-7 from frees were courtesy of fouls on Mullane – we know where the 1-0 came from.

So with the wind favouring Tipp things were ticking along nicely. Statler and Waldorf agreed that as long as we didn’t give away silly goals we had a great chance. The thing about silly goals though is that they are often the result of brilliant play (see: John Mullane) or overwhelming pressure, the chances of a clanger taking place moving towards 1 when the hammer is down. Tipp had been splendidly profligate up front to this point and but Waterford’s defence finally cracked after a well-worked move, Seamus Callanan smartly bouncing the ball into the net. Then Lar Corbett couldn’t gather the ball when he would have been clear through only for Waterford to fail miserably to clear it, allowing Tipp to barge their way back into the danger area and Eoin Kelly to get their second goal.

It was a poor error, but was it any worse than Cummins’ for Waterford’s first goal? Not really, it was just that it exposed how much Waterford had been short of quality possession while Tipp were getting enough chances without us offering them up as gifts. We were praying for half-time which didn’t come early enough to prevent a third Tipp goal, a rapid fire sweep from the deep which culminated in Corbett emphatically ramming the ball past Hennessy. When half-time did arrive the scoreboard was chilling – 3-10 was three points less than Kilkenny had managed in Croke Park last September. The fears of a battering like 1989, and all the attendant concerns about players losing their cool, were prominent in our minds.

Half-time saw a reminder of 1989 in the shape of Bobby Ryan, and all the Munster title wining captains of the last 25 years with one glaring exception – Seán Óg Ó hAilpín. The rights and wrongs of his absence are another day’s work, but credit to the PA who simply ignored his absence, thus avoiding any pompous speechifying about letting down seven generations of Cork Gaels / impassioned cries on behalf of the poor downtrodden GPA.

Waterford got the second half underway like the wind had indeed made a difference, getting two good early chances from Dan Shanahan and John Mullane, both going badly wide before Stephen Molumphy decided to show them how it was done by scoring from way out. Grounds for optimism? It certainly was. There’s always enough potential firepower up front to suggest we could cut loose. The issue was could we hold them to few enough scores given their undoubted firepower – and it should be noted had someone said they’d manage only 1-4, I’d have been spitting on my hands in anticipation og getting them on something shiny at day’s end. But there comes a point when you are so far behind that you feel you are only playing for pride, and that moment came with their fourth goal. It hurts to be whaling on Declan Prendergast, who has never shirked the responsibility of being full-back despite the world and her husband constantly intimating that he is only a place holder until something better comes along. Still, it was a disappointing gaff as under no pressure he left the ball completely behind him, allowing Corbett to score the goal from point blank range. All that effort yet two points worse off than at half-time. It was going to take a Herculean effort to prevent this from turning into a rout.

Thankfully this is exactly what we got from Michael Walsh. It was not as obvious in the first half as we had so few attacks that Brendan Cummins wasn’t dropping puckouts into his part of the field. It was blatant in the second half when his performance was breathtaking. He seemed to win every ball, and he definitely sent every ball that he won back with interest. Allied with Mullane they kept the Tipperary backs honest. It was gratifying to see that Tipp had to keep hurling, and there was a continuous sense of tension among their fans – this probably wasn’t based upon anything we saw on the pitch but memories of previous ambushes; still, nice to see. Some eople did leave early but I’ve seen that at Anfield when the scores are level. In real time, Waterford kept on hacking away, with Maurice Shanahan adding a bit more ball winning power to the forwards but not much in the way of cutting edge. He was a bit unlucky with his goal effort, Conor O’Mahony emerging with the ball despite knowing little about it, but it didn’t exactly fizz off his hurley. A late clutch of points maintained the illusion of drama though in truth it would have been a fall of Devon Loch proportions even when the gap had closed to four points. You felt we could have been there all day and would not have made up the difference.

Cork or Galway are the likely opponents in the next round. Neither would be as formidable as Tipperary so despite this defeat we can look forward to that game with confidence, whoever we play. But having ruminated recently on the desirability of Dublin winning Leinster and putting on us a collision course with Kilkenny should we win Munster, it’s a moot point now. Neither came to pass and Kilkenny stand between us and the All-Ireland final anyway. Nothing we didn’t know already, although it would have been good to let someone else have a pop at them before September. Someone like Tipp.

Waterford: Clinton Hennessy, Eoin Murphy, Declan Prendergast, Noel Connors, Tony Browne, Michael Walsh, Aidan Kearney, Shane O’Sullivan, Kevin Moran (Richie Foley, 0-1), Seamus Prendergast (Maurice Shanahan), Stephen Molumphy (capt, 0-2), Jamie Nagle (Eoin McGrath), John Mullane (1-5), Eoin Kelly (1-7, all frees), Jack Kennedy (Dan Shanahan, 0-1).

Tipperary: Brendan Cummins, Paddy Stapleton, Paul Curran (Brendan Maher), Conor O’Brien, Declan Fanning, Conor O’Mahony (capt, 0-1f), Paul Maher, James Woodlock (Benny Dunne, 0-1), Shane McGrath (0-1), Pat Kerwick (0-1; Hugh Maloney), Seamus Callanan (1-1), John O’Brien (0-1; Michael Webster), Noel McGrath (0-3, 0-1f), Eoin Kelly (1-3, 0-2 f; Willie Ryan), Lar Corbett (2-2)

HT: Tipperary 3-10 (19) Waterford 2-4 (10)

Referee: John Sexton (Cork)

Waterford v Tipperary, 12 July 2009 – Senior

Waterford v Tipperary, 12 July 2009 – Minor