Dreaming of a white summer (article taken from today's Sun Tribune)

[Zulu]

Taken from today's Sunday Tribune

KIERAN McGEENEY, a couple of months down the road since his arrival as Kildare's new senior football manager, still has no idea what he has gotten himself into. That's my belief.

And, as I see it, on this, the first Sunday of 2008, he's got trouble coming his way over the next few years on two different fronts. Firstly, as the most over-hyped and over-indulged footballer of his generation he's in prime position to get his backside well and truly bitten into by the motley crew of young and thirty-something bucks with laptops who latched onto the McGeeney phenomenon for over half a decade and inflated his sense of greatness to bursting point. Secondly, the Kildare county board (which proudly let it be known that only one candidate was interviewed for the vacant managerial position) has placed an unhealthy amount of faith and trust in their man.

There's a third little problem too, but McGeeney is smart enough to see this one coming down the tracks at him . . . it's simply not possible to be an inter-county manager and a Gaelic Players' Association visionary/agitator at the same time. McGeeney now needs to do more than resign as secretary of the GPA. He needs to take one giant step away from Dessie Farrell and the lads.

It should be noted, quickly, before we advance any further this morning into an exploration of Kieran McGeeney's future managerial career, that the former superb captain of the Armagh All Ireland-winning team of 2002 and truly excellent number six never openly sought the truck loads of adulation and wonderment which came his way as a footballer.

On the contrary, that big lip of his and that mournfully long face, which he presented religiously to the Gaelic football world, should have worked a treat in creating an impressively numbered anti-McGeeney faction amongst the country's GAA writers and commentators.

The thing is . . . and which Kieran might very soon discover for himself . . . that amazingly rigid f**k off face of his that entranced and tickled the imagination of football fans will no longer be his greatest ally when he takes up his position on the sideline with the ridiculous stamp of BANISTEOIR across his chest.

Sure, McGeeney might realise this, and his sergeant-at-arms, Armagh's former assistant manager Paul Grimley, who is also about to get a thoroughly severe introduction to the true meaning of the word 'lilywhite', will be present to take care of the new Kildare team boss as much as the Kildare football team.

More than anything else, of course, McGeeney must realise that most of the country will be willing him to fail in this brave new step in his life . . . and included in that number, true as God, will be sizeable number of Kildare folk who, until Kildare look like winning a Leinster title or two and going far beyond the province, will not really give a rat's ass what becomes of the county's new highprofile manager. Welcome to the world of GAA management, Kieran!

And, welcome to the world of Kildare GAA too. A county which has always produced some of the most talented and bankable footballers in the land . . . Tompkins and Fahy, Buckley and Lynch, Rainbow and Doyle . . .

but has always struggled to profit from its riches. A county which, according to its own Mr Moneybags, Seamus Aldridge, is 600,000 in debt and heading in the wrong direction at a fair stride.

And a county which, just two years ago, had welcomed a new managerial team led by John Crofton and Davy Dalton.

Crofton and Dalton were the 'dream team', if only enough of the elders who run Kildare football realised it, and then fought for them and with them, and supported two of the most knowledgeable and passionate football men to be found in the entire county. The pair of them had played their hearts out for Kildare for over a quarter of a century. Each was made of tougher and much bolder material than the talented Kildare defenders of the 80s and 90s. Together, over a five-year or sevenyear period, somewhere in that range, Crofton and Dalton would have had the ability to build a whole new future for Kildare football.

Nobody in Kildare shared that vision, it seemed. Even a dream' home-made managerial team could not do it on their own. Kildare hurtled towards the end of 2007 with a large debt and a top job which nobody else in the place really wanted.

The day before Kieran McGeeney signed on for this adventure of a lifetime, that's how glum it was in Kildare. The day after he signed on, it's still that glum, and all the warm hearts displayed by the county board, and its great words of praise for the incoming managerial pairing from the north, does not change that. Kildare is in a dark place.

Me? I dearly hope Kieran McGeeney, and his good buddy Mr Grimley, and his additional lieutenant Niall Carew, succeed. All of the GAA people in Kildare should also cling to that wish for a long, long time, and never think of letting go. Also, most Gaelic football supporters around Ireland, if they have an ounce of sense, should discount the quick-fix of satisfaction and mini-delight which would be had in watching McGeeney fall flat on his face over the next couple of summers and hastily resigning. That's not what the country needs, folks!

We need Kildare strong and competitive and fighting for a permanent home amongst the top five football teams in the country. We need the team fulfilling its potential, and we need the county board following hot on the team's heels. A county like Kildare should not be redder than red. Geographically, the county is ideally positioned up close to a city with a sprawling population of 1.5million people. Kildare itself has enjoyed 10 brilliant years of a property boom and is perfectly placed to benefit from its own population surge.

One good marketing manager, paid a halfdecent salary of 70-80,000 basic (and a package which could stretch itself to 125150,000 based on commission) would easily scratch his head for a few minutes, and then duly cart into the county board an additional half a million euro in income each year. If counties can appoint full-time secretaries and buy them a box full of biros to look after the fixtures for the year, why are they not appointing full-time marketing managers who, if they are capable of scratching their heads, will not cost their bosses as much as one euro? Kildare could be the first such county. Why not?

It is easy to turn a county's finances around but a more difficult job altogether to turn a county's football fortunes around. The former could be achieved in one year. The latter, by my calculations, and by my own wide-eyed managerial experience of recent times, can hardly be done and dusted in less than five years, minimum.

McGeeney, therefore, even if he had not chosen Kildare, is up against it. Does he have five years? Does he know how lukewarm the average Kildare footballer becomes when faced with the option of being brutalised and becoming a winner? And those warm hearts? Does he know the temperature will drop, sooner rather than later? And all of those young bucks with laptops? Does he know that it will only take one or two of them to start hitting different key combinations and he'll be in for a dose of the Steve Stauntons and Eddie O'Sullivans?

That's where McGeeney might find himself, being hounded from match to match, and having all sorts of geniuses on the ditches with laptops and with just big mouths, insisting on doing his job for him, and insisting that, with one eye closed, they could do the job better than Kieran McGeeney.

While he did not personally choose his place in Irish sport, nor a role revered by the Irish media, McGeeney was elevated to a place which is normally only inhabited by those who are performing on the world stage for Ireland, and by those within Ireland who have performed sufficiently well to have four or five All Ireland medals on their chests.

McGeeney was, and remains, in a place far above his true station in Irish life. Actually, I'd call it a spot more than a place. McGeeney's in a spot.

He picked, just about, the toughest job in Gaelic football. If he does succeed in this new role as a team boss . . . and success in Kildare can only be underlined if a Leinster championship-winning team with real All Ireland credentials is built . . . then he will have achieved something magical.

Those who have touched upon the magical over the last quarter of a century in Gaelic football and hurling have traditionally been home-grown managers. Look at how successful Seamus McEnaney is proving in Monaghan. Look at how unsuccessful his predecessor, Colm Coyle, proved to be. And look at how successful Colm Coyle is already proving in Meath.

The magic, and the success, normally comes from hard work . . . and working weeks which average 60 hours more than 40 hours.

Living in a county makes it easier to pack more hours into the week. Living in a county, and amongst your own team, also helps on other fronts too. There's less time for your team to listen to others and there is less time for the begrudgers and the truly bitter to work their own scorchery.

Gaelic football needs an injection of life in 2008. It needs Tyrone back to their best, but it also needs Monaghan moving up to an even higher gear and another Monaghan or two as well. There were too few competitive teams in 2007. The also-rans were numbered in the high 20s. Too much more of this carry on and those who are putting good money into the GAA's high-priced All Ireland sponsorship packages might come to the conclusion that they have been sold a pup.

Kildare have been amongst the also-rans for nearly 10 years, and all through this period of time those of us who live close to the county and who have friends in the strong parishes in the county know in our hearts that this is wrong. The Kildare football team should be one of the most attractive and exciting products in the GAA. It should be, every year, win or lose, a thrilling team in white.

No doubt that is why Kieran McGeeney took the job and talked other good men into getting to work with him. I wonder, however, by now, has he been sufficiently humble and smart to visit the homes of John Crofton and Davy Dalton. There, behind the front doors of these two men, lie some early, precious answers which might make all the difference between McGeeney quitting in two noisy years or quietly nestling in for five long, happy, revealing, sustaining summers.

 

[orangeman]

Interesting article - a bit hard hitting at this stage.

[thebandit]

I think Hayes is sore because he wasn't approached himself 

[Uladh]

Do the tribune pay hayes for that ?

[Zulu]

Yeah I guess they do, I must say I am very disappointed with the standard of his articles. I read his book many years ago and it was very good but now it appears as if he thinks of a topic to write and then tries to frame it in such a way as to be controversial.

[Seany]

Dcecne article, but loke Kerry did, not a bad one foe Mcgeeney to pin up on his bedroom wall just to remind himself of how hard he has to work and the number of people he has to prove wrong...

[muppet]

What a load of bollix (I am a thirty-something writing from a laptop). He has a go at McGeeney, his lip, his face, all Kildare footballers,  the Kildare County Board and their financial acumen and all thirty-somethings with both an opinion and a laptop.

The crux of his article is:

1. go home you don't belong anywhere else
2. don't be ugly
3. you are nothing if you don't have string of All-Ireland medals
4. laptops are like opinions and assholes, everybody's got one
5. Kildare are gutless lily-livered cheese-eating surrender monkeys
6. Crofton and Dalton are exceptions to 5.
7. We should all visit Crofton and Dalton and say we are sorry

More seriously he claims that McGeeney's reputation is merely a creation of the chat-rooms and that they who put him up will kick him on the way down." Firstly, as the most over-hyped and over-indulged footballer of his generation he's in prime position to get his backside well and truly bitten into by the motley crew of young and thirty-something bucks with laptops who latched onto the McGeeney phenomenon for over half a decade and inflated his sense of greatness to bursting point"

As a member of the thirty-something bucks with laptops born miles away from Armagh I heard about McGeeney through club football circles. Most Northerners would have been familiar with him long ago and from 1999 most southern fans knew who he was. We didn't hear about him in the chat-rooms we merely chatted about him there. We didn't inflate any reputation or ego, we just posted our opinions, much like Hayes does in his articles.

Of course a man with 2 all-Irelands and more particularly an NUJ card is entitled to publicly dismiss all opinions contrary to his own.

But so is a thirty-something buck with a laptop.

[lynchbhoy]

anything more than abject failure for mcgeeney at kildare will be an actual success.

if he wants to make it in intercounty management, then unless he is the luckiest of the lucky - his lack of experience, and the poor county team he has taken over - will mean he wont do much in this job.

However, it will teach him most of what he needs for the next job. Which is possibly what he is hoping.
Maybe his sights are on the armagh job, next time it comes up.

[Uladh]

Or the Dublin one?