Today’s Hospital Pass: pity poor old Limerick, and the bankers crank up the pressure on Donegal.
On the face of it, although it’s probably true that anything better than all-out famine, pestilence and natural disaster in 2011 would have been an improvement on the horror that was 2010, Limerick hurlers have had a good year.
After last year’s mutiny in the county, Donal O’Grady (pictured top) took over at the helm, steadied the ship and, at the risk of alienating any reader with a loathing of shipping metaphors, steered her back to land.
Limerick were promoted back to Division 1, getting the better of Munster rivals Clare in the process, and while the championship brought battling defeats to Waterford and Dublin, it was decent progress by all usual measures.
But they may as well not have bothered, according to county secretary Mike O’Riordan, who says that the recent restructuring of the National Hurling League has effectively drawn a line through Limerick’s achievements in the spring.
“We’re effectively in the second division again, no matter how it is dressed up,” he said. “With respect to the other teams in Division 1B, we won’t be attracting big gates to the Gaelic Grounds. When you add everything together, we put the cost at €100,000.
“We won’t have Kilkenny or Tipperary in the Gaelic Grounds and that won’t draw the crowds. The raised profile we were anticipating has been taken away.”
Bankers molly-coddle Donegal
If the sense of injustice is all too apparent in Limerick, in Donegal things are a lot more subtle – but no less damaging for all that.
On the face of it, the greatest manager in the county’s history being handed a place in MBNA’s Kick Fada Hall of Fame is a good thing.
Brian McEniff deserves it, for everything he’s done for Donegal. He was a good player, a better hotelier and an even better manager.
But really, we fear this could have been timed better from Donegal’s point of view. Is it really a good thing, after finally overcoming two decades in which the footballers of the county have operated in the shadow of McEniff’s 1992 team, to have the achievements of that team brought back to the forefront of everyone’s thinking? This week, of all weeks, when Donegal travel to Croke Park as unconsidered underdogs against Dublin?
But wait. Donegal? Unconsidered underdogs? Against Dublin?
Where have I heard that before?
