Today’s Hospital Pass is an angry one, with some preening media coverage and elaborate Donegal theatrics causing our blood to boil.
After yesterday’s debacle at Croke Park, we expected there to be absolute outrage amongst the printed element of the fourth estate this morning, but to be honest, the reaction was far more timid than expected.
While most scribes lamented what went on at headquarters as a spectacle and understandably expressed concerns about the future of Gaelic football if this was the blueprint, the predicted tidal wave of abuse in Donegal’s direction didn’t quite materialise, not in the papers we cast our eyes over this morning in any case.
That was until the Evening Herald reached shops across the capital sometime in the afternoon. Located just above the ‘Assassins taken out’ headline on the front page were a series of bullet points pointing readers towards the analysis of yesterday’s game, including one with the line ‘How Dublin saved the GAA’ attached.
All GAA followers should be relieved that Donegal won’t be in the showpiece on the third Sunday of September, we were told, the article suggesting that we all owe Dublin a debt of gratitude for getting one over on Jim McGuinness’s uber-defensive outfit.
Amongst the sentiments expressed were lines such as: “We should all be grateful to Dublin for saving the game of Gaelic football,” and a little later: “The final between Kerry and Donegal would have been a runner for the worst final of all time”.
We’re sorry, but what arrogant bullsh*t.
Who’s to say that, if Donegal got through, that (a) Kerry wouldn’t come up with a more effective way of counteracting Donegal’s system than Dublin did and (b, albeit a pretty far-fetched notion) that Donegal wouldn’t have thrown off the shackles against the Kingdom, two possibilities that could have made the hypothetical final a far more entertaining affair than would have been predicted.
The article makes Dublin out to be like knights in shining sky blue armour sent forth from above to prevent Gaelic football from sliding into the abyss.
Is this the same Dublin that didn’t score from play until the 60th minute? Who scored two points from play in an All-Ireland semi-final? We imagine that the overwhelming emotion in the Dublin camp will be of relief and not a grand sense of satisfaction at being some sort of saving grace for the GAA.
They didn’t play next or near well, but they showed remarkable character to dig it out in the end and after umpteen attempts, have made it to a stage that has eluded them for 16 years.
Pat Gilroy has gone out of his way to avoid undue hype being placed on his squad in the last couple of seasons. The last thing he needs before the final is preening crap like this.
Hang your head Marty
While our blood is boiling, we can’t discuss yesterday’s game without a reference to Donegal’s Marty Boyle, who went down like the proverbial sack of spuds when he had his face caressed by Diarmuid Connolly as the game wore to a close.
Technically, because he raised his hands and performed a striking action, Connolly’s red card was merited, but to miss an All-Ireland final for that is an injustice on the same scale as Laurent Blanc missing the 1998 World Cup Final thanks to some gamesmanship of behalf of Slaven Bilic.
As a certain Meathman in this office remarked this morning, had that been Cristiano Ronaldo, Joey Barton or Didier Drogba that engaged in theatrics like that, we’d be queuing up to sneer and pour scorn.
What makes it worse is that for at least 60 minutes, Donegal players delivered some of the finest (and fair) hits seen in Croke Park in many a year. And then Boyle had to go and do that.
We’re sure it was heat of the moment stuff and that he regretted it afterwards, but it will make for uncomfortable viewing when he does eventually get round to watching the game again. Not that we’d recommend him doing so, mind.
