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Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Are Mayo boys pulling together?
BY ANTHONY HENNIGAN
CHOPPY are the waters sailed by Mayo County Board in recent times. But then that tends to be the way for most governments of late, be they elected for office in McHale Park or Mumbai, Great Britain or Greece.
Here in Mayo, last year ended with the stormy exchanges at the County Board’s annual convention which caused the dissolving of the Ardagh/Moygownagh GAA Club amalgamation and this year opened with the Board’s very public spat with local councillors and some McHale Road residents, a stand off that ultimately forced the cancellation of a televised floodlit National League opener against Galway. The chance to flaunt Mayo’s brand new GAA development to a nationwide audience had been lost.
Then came the administration oversight that resulted in county footballer Mark Ronaldson left unaware of (and therefore missing) a scheduled hearing at Croke Park where he planned to appeal against a four week suspension. He did so a week late.
And whilst Mayo’s was not the only County Board that seemingly failed to make its senior team management aware of the rule changes passed at Congress 2009 i.e. that head to head results would be used ahead of scoring differences to separate teams equal on points in this year’s National Football League, officials at GAA headquarters wasted no time in pointing out that it was the responsibility of the respective boards to do so.
And then connections with the Mayo team (exactly who, nobody seems sure), somewhat hastily, arrange an overseas team training camp that flies in the face of the rules of the association, a rule passed so recent that it surely should have been fresh in the mind of men whose job it is to be au fait with same. No, it hasn’t been the most glorious administrative period.
And whilst it has always struck me as quite unfair how some folk never waste an opportunity to blame Mayo County Board whenever there is a poor result on the pitch (the Board apparently took a bit of a hammering on the airwaves after the recent National League final defeat to Cork), I am nevertheless reminded of John O’Mahony’s past writings as a columist for this newspaper, where he used refer to the “unity of purpose” required of all parties, management, players and County Board alike, if a county team is to have chance of success.
“There are plenty of opinions out there as to what is wrong but the one essential now is that everybody works in unison to strive for that success which will only emerge if there is a unity of purpose in the county,” wrote the current manager at the time of his appointment.
Talk to some County Board officials and they’ll tell you they were fully aware that the Mayo senior team’s proposed trip to Portugal this week was against the rules and doomed for failure, just that it wasn’t they to who the players (whose idea the training camp allegedly was) looked to make the arrangements in the first place. Does that suggest a situation where all parties in Mayo football are working in unison?
Páidí at his playful best
THE GAA won’t let the Mayo team fly out of the country yet not even the ash cloud can stop Páidí Ó Sé from helicoptering his way from Kerry to Kiltimagh to tell all of his love for Mayo. It’s a mixed up GAA world that we live in.
If it was to witness how tetchy the Ventry man’s rendezvous with John O’Mahony might be considering Ó Sé’s blatant courting of the Mayo manager’s job earlier this year that the crowds flocked to the Park Hotel on Saturday night, then the attendees were to be disappointed as the duo’s show of affection was anything but staged.
Páidí: (Reflecting on past disappointments as a manager) I haven’t cracked the Mickey Harte system at all at all, and I don’t think any other manager has.
Johnno: Can I come in there, Mr Chairman? Páidí, I know you’ve had your difficulties with Tyrone but there’s a man sitting here beside me (John Maughan) who cracked Tyrone in 2004. Perhaps he could give you a bit of a hand?
Páidí: And Johnno, having said that, I’m always available to you!
Brian Talty: You can see the Fianna Fail and Fine Gael fellas at it again.
Martin Carney: It might be one of the first mixed marriages we’re going to get.
What better way could one have wished to spend a Saturday night than to while it away in the company of such enthralling characters as the above, not to forget another Mayo great, Peter Ford. Congratulations to Kiltimagh GAA Club for their arranging of such an entertaining and worthwhile occasion of debate among some of the GAA’s most experienced and charismatic creatures.
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