Topics

Judging by the chatter there is only one match worth talking about.

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/sport/2011/0713/1224300652267.html
THE REMORSELESS nature of both provincial hurling finals leaves us under no illusions about the remainder of the season. Assuming that the All-Ireland will be between Tipperary and Kilkenny, it will be the third successive final to match the counties.  So to all intents and purposes, Kilkenny and Tipp are on the verge of making history this September

What are the chances of a slip up by either team ?   

1.) FINE : This is the word women use to end an argument when they are right and you need to shut up.

2.) Five Minutes : If she is getting dressed, this means a half an hour. Five Minutes is only five minutes if you have just been given five more minutes to watch the game before helping around the house.

3.) Nothing : This is the calm before the storm. This means something, and you should be on your toes. Arguments that begin with nothing usually end in fine.

4.) Go Ahead : This is a dare, not permission. Don't Do It!

5.) Loud Sigh : This is actually a word, but is a non-verbal statement often misunderstood by men. A loud sigh means she thinks you are an idiot and wonders why she is wasting her time standing here and arguing with you about nothing. (Refer back to #3 for the meaning of nothing.)

6.) That's Okay : This is one of the most dangerous statements a women can make to a man. That's okay means she wants to think long and hard before deciding how and when you will pay for your mistake.

7.) Thanks : A woman is thanking you, do not question, or Faint. Just say you're welcome.

8.) Whatever : Is a women's way of saying F@!K YOU!

9.) Don't worry about it, I got it : Another dangerous statement, meaning this is something that a woman has told a man to do several times, but is now doing it herself. This will later result in a man asking, "what's wrong", for the woman's response refer to #3

So how good are Cork boy ?
If Galway play as a team anything could happen.

Keith Duggan has a very good analysis here

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/sport/2011/0625/1224299583517.html

There is a jaded feel about the old competition this year. The price of tickets has become the only hot topic of this championship. Even the players are complaining now that the All-Ireland, stretching from mid-May to mid September, is unnecessarily long. Young players are back on the emigration trail. The romance of the qualifiers is over. The players are looking around at the empty seats and the penny is beginning to drop. Heroic though the players were and are still, all those full houses were not people coming to see them, per se.

.. Some year soon, the GAA is going to have to reimagine the All-Ireland championship and make it a bolder and leaner competition. If they leave it as it is, the All-Ireland championship will slowly lose its way. And it is too important and too great for that.

Nicky English :

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/sport/2011/0620/1224299224281.html

"Whatever about making a late charge, Galway looked in real trouble for most of the game. After last year's performance against Tipperary in the All-Ireland quarter-final you'd expect they'd kick on this summer, but I think in contrast to Dublin, they've gone backwards. I suppose the warning signs were there during the league but they've got a lot to do now if they want to beat Clare, and I actually fancy Clare might take them. If you look as well at the Galway panel you have to wonder are they really as good a team as some people think, or are they just over-hyped. John McIntyre replaced three of his six forwards and both midfielders, and yet none of them had the desired impact. They've had a lot of success at minor and under-21 level, but the question has to be asked whether or not they are simply up to it at this grade. They certainly lacked the necessary commitment and intent that Dublin showed, and without that you won't win anything."

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2011/0620/breaking90.html

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2010/1204/1224284774265.html
"In a police interview played to the jury, O'Loughlin said she did not recall kissing the woman, but admitted it was possible."

It reminds me of the short story "Nora Mharcais Bhig" by Padraig O Conaire with alcohol right at the heart of it.

[Official confirms email saying emirate 'bought' World Cup]

Fresh Fifa crisis over Qatar's 2022 bid
Official confirms email saying emirate 'bought' World Cup
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/1a1607aa-8ac0-11e0-b2f1-00144feab49a.html

Bin Hammam suspended
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/2aaa1fee-89bb-11e0-beff-00144feab49a.html#axzz1Np0CTswP

Fifa opens way for Blatter re-election
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/981ab1ec-8a42-11e0-beff-00144feab49a.html#axzz1Np0CTswP

Fifa 's own goal has changed the game
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/981ab1ec-8a42-11e0-beff-00144feab49a.html#axzz1Np0CTswP

And then, in football news, Barcelona win a match

[Kieran Shannon's article on Frank McGuigan, printed in the Sunday Tribune on 21 September 2003 and reproduced here, has won this year's McNamee award for the best GAA article in a national newspaper.]

O'Neill seems to have a load of classic GAA board posts saved. Does anyone out there have any timeless GAA journalism handy ? I thought it would be an interesting subject for a thread.  Here is one to get the ball rolling :

Kieran Shannon's article on Frank McGuigan, printed in the Sunday Tribune on 21 September 2003 and reproduced here, has won this year's McNamee award for the best GAA article in a national newspaper.

The rise, fall and rise again of Tyrone's greatest player Brian McGuigan's father Frank is a true legend of the game, despite a career overshadowed by alcoholism A boy goes to a match with his father. It's in Clones, the 1984 Ulster final, his own Tyrone playing Armagh. It leaves him mesmerised. At full-forward for Tyrone is Frank McGuigan, the man just back from America. It's as if he's never been away. Armagh put three men on him and it makes no difference. Eleven times the ball is played into him, 11 times he scores. Five with his right, five with his left, one with his fist. The 13 year-old goes home to Glencull that night. He makes a decision. He wants to be a two-footed player. He wants to be Frank McGuigan. So he hits the local pitch and starts kicking ball after ball over thea posts. A few weeks later, a video of the match is floating around Tyrone. His father gets it for him. The boy studies it "three to 70 times". He keeps going to that pitch in Glencull, working on his left, his right, his dummy solo. Nineteen years later, that same boy kicks 11 points in an Ulster final. He's captain of his team the same day. When he collects the cup, he thanks his father who has just passed away for bringing him to Clones all those years ago. Peter Canavan never played underage club football. He didn't have to. A vision of Frank McGuigan was enough.
"'84, yeah. Ach, I did rightly but I was past my best at that stage. It was a thing I never got too excited about, to be honest, football. I always took it as something that you had or you hadn't. I wasn't prepared to work with it like. I could drink on a Saturday night and go out and play on the Sunday and it wouldn't seem to bother me. I wish I had been about today when I'd have known the importance of winning an All Ireland; I could have made a fortune out of it. In our time winning Ulster was the big thing. Like, f**k it after that. Because we drank and we drank and we drank. Especially me. I try to preach to the young boys now, OEFuck the drink.' I'm five years not drinking now and I'm the happiest I've ever been. I wouldn't have what I have with Brian and the kids if I hadn't done something. But see me there when I was drinking? I wouldn't have cared if the house was on fire. "Looking back, I'll never understand why I drank after the accident. I sometimes wonder if I hadn't got hurtS That's my one regret, that I let myself crash. When Brian and the boys were starting out in that school field back there, I couldn't go down with them. I'm not talking about coaching them like, I mean just kicking around with them. But then I probably would have been too busy drinking anyway. I might go without it for six months, then drink for three weeks. And I mean three weeks of pure f**king drink. Christ, you talk about George Best!S"
In Ulster football, Frank McGuigan is George Best; either the best player you've seen or the best you've never seen. Damien Barton says possibly the greatest privilege in his career was to come on for Derry in a McKenna Cup game in Cookstown and be on the same pitch as Frank McGuigan; Barton has won an All Ireland. Barton's old coach, Eamon Coleman, would cross the county bounds just to see McGuigan play. Only Mick O'Connell and Jim McKeever, Coleman reckons, could catch a ball as well as McGuigan. It was as if he was floating in the air, a skill McGuigan himself puts down to his parents' house in Ardboe; it mightn't have had any electricity, but it had a roof which he'd throw a tennis ball onto time and time again. Noel McGinn, who played with McGuigan in that famous Ulster final in 1984, swears that in one under-21 game against Cavan in Dungannon, a pile of players were around the square waiting for this high ball to come in when McGuigan just hung in the air, took it down with one hand and waltzed out with it. Mickey Harte played with the Tyrone minor team which McGuigan captained to an Ulster title in 1972. McGuigan, he says, was the most versatile and gifted player he has ever seen. He could catch a ball as if he had never left the ground. He could point with either foot. And he had that dummy solo. Harte maintains it should be called the McGuigan dummy. He's seen plenty of players, from Tony McManus to Canavan, perfect it since McGuigan. No one had even tried it before McGuigan. Martin McHugh can appreciate that. He played with McGuigan in the 1984 Railway Cup final. That day McGuigan had his back to goal and made this swivel with his hips which Connacht's Stephen Kinneavy bought completely. That goal won Ulster the Railway Cup. "I'd never seen a move like it before," says McHugh, "and I've never seen anything like it since." In Tyrone, they hadn't seen anything like him either. By the time he was 16, he already had legions of grown men who'd go anywhere in the county just to see him play. One day they went to see Ardboe against Carrickmore in the championship. There was a strong breeze that day. In the first half, Ardboe were playing with it, so they put McGuigan centre-forward where he ran up a big score to give Ardboe a considerable lead. In the second half they moved him to centre-back to defend it. He did. Sixteen year-olds weren't meant to do that against Carrickmore. Seventeen year-olds weren't meant to destroy Bellaghy either. That's what McGuigan did though in one Ulster club championship game. Coleman reckons that it was as good a display from midfield as the one McGuigan gave from full-forward against Armagh in '84. McGuigan himself thinks it was even better.
And so it continued. By the time he was 18 he had captained the Tyrone minors to the Ulster title and come on for the seniors the same day. By the time he was 19 he had once again been up the steps in Clones, this time to claim the title for the seniors. By the time he was 23 he had already been a four-time All Star replacement. He was a legend. He was also an alcoholic. The two went hand in hand. Frank McGuigan didn't have to buy a drink. Everyone loved his affable manner and everyone loved to say they bought Frank McGuigan a drink. After a match he'd be having a whiskey, when he'd look around and there would be another 10 glasses around him. Some were concerned. Jody O'Neill, McGuigan's old friend and county coach, says that in 1973, the same year McGuigan inspired Tyrone to the senior and under-21 Ulster titles, the county board told O'Neill to cut McGuigan. O'Neill, the county manager, said that if McGuigan went, so would he. Drink didn't seem to affect McGuigan on the pitch. The Saturday night before an All-Ireland under-21 semi-final in Galway, supporters found McGuigan lying drunk on a pavement; he was Tyrone's best player the next day. He had a habit of that. Johnny Hughes of Galway tells a story about the man he reckons was the greatest player and character he ever came across. One year on an All Star trip, Hughes knocked on McGuigan's door, wondering if he'd be able to play after an hour-and-a-half of sleep. "Frank got up and destroyed Brian Mullins. He was head and shoulders above everyone else that day." Some days he wasn't. McGuigan recalls one Ulster championship against Derry in '76. He had come home loaded at five in the morning. A few hours later the taxi appeared to bring him to the game in Clones. "My father never told me what to do or not to do about football in his life. But that morning he said, OESon, do the team a favour. Don't go to that game.' I was still drunk in the dressing room. I got a point but I can't remember anything about it. Derry won and ended up winning Ulster. We'd have won it if I hadn't been drunk. But again, I never put a pile of thought into it." Then he went to America and became the king of Gaelic Park. "Went." He laughs at that. Makes it sound like a decision. He tells how he "went" to America. In 1977, he was an All Star replacement. They arrived in Kennedy Airport on the Friday night and basically drank until the game that Sunday. After the game they drank some more until the bus came to bring them back to JFK. "Go on to f**k, I'm staying," McGuigan laughed to Sean Doherty. And he did. The next thing he was waking up in an apartment in the Bronx and the lads from Cookstown were away to work. That's how he "went" to America. For six years. He enjoyed it there. Met a girl, Geraldine, got married, had kids. Got a job in construction ("Didn't do a lot, I can assure you. The best job any man could have!"). No one bothered him there. He liked that, the neighbours not knowing who he was. At home, everyone did. Everyone does. Earlier this year Brian went out with his girlfriend and a few clubmates in Cookstown. Some of the clubmates got drunk. The next day Mickey Harte was asking Brian had he drank. Brian hadn't. Why had someone told Mickey he had?
Tyrone flew Frank McGuigan home to help them out in '82 and '83. Then they asked him to move home for good. He did; the kids would soon be starting school. The following July he kicked those 11 points. He hadn't lost it. Other habits hadn't faded either. One Saturday that November, he took a few hours from building his house to play a club league game for Ardboe. It was in the Moy against the Moy; Sean Cavanagh's father, Teddy, marked him. After the game he jumped into his Hiace van and was on the way home when he looked to his right and spotted a few Ardboe cars outside a pub. He turned round and had a few there. When he finally left for Ardboe, it wasn't for the house but for Forbes' bar, the place where he works now. They tell him that they actually had the keys off him but that somehow he got them back. By the time he came round he was in an ambulance on the M2 to Belfast. He couldn't understand why he couldn't walk. Then they told him that he crashed into the local church wall, that his right leg was completely shattered and that he could never play football again. He was just glad to be alive. "I was a very, very lucky boy. I'm able to get around the place, even if one leg is shorter than the other. Like, Matt Connor was in a crash the month after and it left him paralysed. I'd be grateful for things like that. And that I didn't hurt anyone else." He thinks of all the other things he could have been doing. Ireland were having trials for the Compromise Rules series that day but McGuigan had turned down the invite, telling the selectors that he was too busy building his house. "Normally," he laughs, "I wouldn't put work ahead of anything!" As that day turned out, he still put the drink ahead of it. The drink would continue to be put ahead of everything. When the little boy Canavan played in the 1995 All Ireland final, McGuigan didn't even see it; instead he lay in his car in Dublin, drunk. Once he managed to give it up for about a year when he went off to Clare for a golfing weekend. "We were in the clubhouse after our first round when I said, OEOkay, I'll have one of those nice pints of Guinness, no more and go back to the hotel.' I didn't play golf for the rest of the trip. I actually slept on the bus, all the way from Clare to here, and it's a long, long way from Clare to here." A fall-out was inevitable. One day when he finished a lengthy binge, he found Geraldine was gone and had taken the kids with her. He immediately turned to the drink again but realised there were no solutions in it. It was the problem. So he went for help in a clinic in Derry. For six weeks. Not to get Geraldine back, but to get Frank McGuigan back. He hated Frank McGuigan when he drank. All those years, they weren't fun. At times he thought they were, but they weren't. "How can you be having fun if you can't remember?" He's a new man now, this past five years.

A happy man, bursting with his life. Brian, Tommy and the youngest lad, 11 year-old Shay, are all back with him. It's a different life; when they come home at five o'clock, he's there. Gerry and himself are still friends. So are all the kids. When he sees fellas who he knows are drinking too much, he tells them they won't believe the benefits of coming off it. He's been to America twice, Portugal three times, golfing. He plans to go to Australia sometime. Things he'd never have been interested in if he were drinking. That's why he's not afraid to tell his story. People must know how lethal drink can be. He's concerned with the culture that goes with the GAA. Ardboe have a match two weeks after the All Ireland. Last week they had a team meeting where they agreed that if Tyrone won the All Ireland, they'd be off the drink by the Thursday. "It's very bad saying you're going to drink from Sunday to Wednesday. Why not just say, OEWe'll quit on Wednesday if we drink that length of time at all?'" McGuigan is coaching that Ardboe team. It's his first year involved and it's going well; that's a county semi-final they're playing in a fortnight's time. He says it's not him helping out Ardboe; it's Ardboe helping him. His sons Brian, Tommy and Frank all play for the club. It's another way of making up for lost time. "When I was drinking, I hurt people. Especially the kids. I had no patience when I drank. I wouldn't have gone to parent-teacher meetings, things like that. It's the least I owe them." The young lads are generating some folklore themselves. Last year Ardboe scored a goal that featured seven passes. Only the McGuigans were involved in it; no one else was on their wavelength. Twenty-five year-old Frank is on the senior panel. Nineteen year-old Tommy won a minor All Ireland two years ago and is on the county under-21 team; he'll be something else, maintains Frank Senior, if they can come up with a way to pay for the operation needed to sort out his knee once and for all. And then there's 23 year-old Brian. Frank says he doesn't give him any advice, that's what Mickey Harte is for. Harte maintains he has to say very little either; only Peter Canavan, the Tyrone manager reckons, has the same footballing brain. Art McRory once said it was impossible to give Frank McGuigan a bad pass; the current Tyrone team say it's impossible for Brian McGuigan to give one. "I've never seen him have a bad game this year," says his own father. "One pass and he can turn a game. He turned the Ulster final on it's head. For people to even say that the man-of-the-match that day was anyone else angers me. He should be recognised for the player he is. He's not and it's not fair. Like, the last day in Croke Park they announced him as OEBrian McGuigan, son of Frank McGuigan.'" Neither of them should take any offence that he was described as Frank's son. As Canavan would agree, in a way, every Tyrone footballer is.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VdS61w8HXG4

"Good evening. I'm a pawn of the Koch brothers lying about deficits to end collective bargaining trying to break unions. I promised jobs, but it seems all I want to do is CUT them from the middle class, & then give $152 million in Tax Cuts on January 11th to corporations. I'm totally full of sh#t & will be removed from office soon"

[there is no one bearing the name "Mathilde Redmatn" in the employ of the ICRC. There is someone called "Mathilde De Riedmatten]

http://mondoweiss.net/2011/04/mathilde-redmatn-and-the-humanitarian-crisis-in-gaza.html


A couple of days ago, a story appeared on the IDF Spokesperson's Website which essentially reports on an interview with one "Mathilde Redmatn", deputy head of the Red Cross in Gaza. The author quotes Redmatn as saying:

"There is no humanitarian crisis in Gaza," she explains. "If you go to the supermarket, there are products. There are restaurants and a nice beach.  The problem is mainly in maintenance of infrastructure and in access to goods, concrete for example. Israel has the legitimate right to protect the civilian population..."

As one might expect, this "bombshell" was quickly scooped up by the corporate press, and covered (sometimes with extra spin) by CNN, Haaretz, JPost and so on. Now, I'm naturally skeptical of anything that appears in the corporate press or in a government press releases, and this was no exception, although I do have respect for the ICRC.

What became immediately apparent is that seemingly no one within the corporate media had bothered to check the veracity of the story. Had they done so, they would have found that there is no one bearing the name "Mathilde Redmatn" in the employ of the ICRC. There is someone called "Mathilde De Riedmatten", a trivial fact that I was able to glean from speaking with the ICRC in Jerusalem, a fact that not one journalist seemed to care about enough to check.

This is a perfect example of what Herman and Chomsky described as the corporate media's "symbiotic relationship with powerful sources of information" - the simple, reciprocal understanding that if you provide the information, I'll print it, without question.

We already knew from the Palestine Papers that:

"As part of their overall embargo plan against Gaza, Israeli officials have confirmed to (U.S. embassy economic officers) on multiple occasions that they intend to keep the Gazan economy on the brink of collapse without quite pushing it over the edge," whilst keeping the Gazan economy "functioning at the lowest level possible consistent with avoiding a humanitarian crisis".
A noble strategy indeed.

From the Palestinian perspective, the term "humanitarian crisis" is to be used by the corporate media, propagandists and humanitarian organisations. It in no way, shape or form alters the reality on the ground. What might amount to normalcy in Gaza would undoubtedly be viewed as a crisis in say the US for example. So, whilst it is of little value to debate the existence or non-existence of a "humanitarian crisis", it is useful to remind ourselves of the facts.

We know from the UN's March update that a majority of Gazans are food insecure and rely on aid.
We know that Gaza's fishermen are limited to fishing within 3 miles of the shore, in a stretch of water heavily contaminated with raw sewage. (Incidentally this raw sewage also contaminates Gazas "nice beach")
We know that 35% of agricultural land is off limits to farmers, unless they wish to find death at the hands of the IDF, and this doesn't take into account agricultural land rendered inoperable as a result of the Gaza Massacre.
We know that 90% of drinking water extracted from the aquifer is brackish and fail's to meet the WHO's standard for drinking water.
In the drive to reduce the plight of the people of Gaza down to a sound bite, the details get lost, the facts become noise. Let's not make that mistake. Let's look at the documentary record and let's expose the corporate media for what they are - the faithful servants of established power. I have asked the ICRC in Jerusalem for clarification on this issue, and await their reply.       

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/mar/04/england-lose-31-mps-commons-changes

Clubs need a Roosevelt to help beat great debt burden
The GAA should attempt to write off some of the loans that are crippling clubs, says Colm O'Rourke
By Colm O'Rourke
Sunday February 27 2011
T his week there has been some comment on the steps being taken by the Thomas Davis club in Tallaght to tackle a serious debt problem. It is only the tip of the iceberg. There are stories like this in every county, and there are county boards who are in major financial difficulty as well. Much of this money was borrowed in the middle of the last decade when Ireland was a different place to what it is now.
What has happened since is that the debt burden has become crushing, revenues to all clubs and counties have fallen, at best a little, but more generally a lot so furnishing repayments to banks has become an intolerable strain on bodies whose purpose is to supply games, not act as financial gurus.
If the law of the jungle prevailed in these situations, the trustees of the various clubs could be held responsible or the property could be seized and the asset used to generate the loan could be sold off. It would make for an interesting auction somewhere in the country if the banks seized the local pitch and put it up to the highest bidder.
There are not too many auctioneers who would take that one on. Anyway a pitch in a rural area is only worth farming prices and there are few farmers who would want to be tinged for a lifetime by getting into such murky waters. In towns and cities, it is not a whole lot different -- these lands are zoned amenity so they are worth nothing. Of course what has happened to Thomas Davis is that they are now severely penalised for doing the work of the local authority. It is the responsibility of the urban body to provide facilities for sport for the young population as is done in every other European country. Historically, the GAA has stepped in to do the job when others failed and have been left with it and the resultant financial headaches.
This is the same story in every town in the country; the brilliant investment in social capital is now keeping a lot of GAA administrators awake at night as they wonder what they have got their clubs into. They should not worry in the least. Any organisation which puts faith in young people and tries to improve things for them as previous generations have done has nothing to apologise for.
Laid out on a blank sheet the future for many clubs looks quite bleak. Projections made at the height of the 'boom' must be consigned to history. Falling revenues from sponsorship, membership, bar takings and all other club fundraising activity is merely a fact of life and is not coming back any day soon. Much worse is the fact that a lot of young people who facilities were provided for have left the country and won't be back for a while either.
Of course we can all complain that the banks were in a hurry to put the umbrella up when the sun was shining and took it down immediately when the rains came. Socrates is not needed for that assessment. It was ever so and there is not much point in getting hung up on that. In fact, I feel sorry for people who work in banks; they are under a lot of pressure too and many of them are active in clubs which are in financial trouble so it is not a pleasant job for them either.
Against this background the attitude of anything being possible which was the currency of five years ago has been replaced by anger, frustration and cynicism. It is like the USA of the thirties when the great depression struck. They had Roosevelt who gave hope and helped plot a way forward. Hopefully a new Government led by Enda Kenny can give people back some expectation that the future can be brighter. Certainly Kenny and other potential cabinet members like Jimmy Deenihan know as much about the problems of clubs as anyone in the country. They also know the value of a healthy GAA.
They have seen what working together for the common good can achieve, even if All-Ireland winning captain Deenihan at corner-back today would probably have three yellow cards before the parade is over! Yet with Kerry he exemplified a lack of self-interest or ego in order to help the team prevail. It is a bigger team now but the same principles prevail.
In the situation we find ourselves in there are plenty of ways for the GAA to help themselves. One of the not-so-nice aspects of the current crisis is the amount of people who write article after article full of bile and vitriol about recent events but offer no alternative. That is a very easy option and only brings out the worst in some individuals.
Most people understand the situation very well and want someone to plot a way forward, however difficult, but one which is credible and gives hope.
In the case of the GAA, this is a time of self-help, the same attribute which has created the magnificent facilities of today. It is a time
for county boards, provincial councils and the central authority in Croke Park to come together and get an accurate picture of the scale of indebtedness facing clubs all over the country.
After that there should be meetings with the financial institutions involved to work out a deal. These meetings would not take long as most of the money borrowed is either with Bank of Ireland or AIB. The task should be to get a write-down of part of the overall capital debt which is being carried by clubs and counties. Everyone would benefit pro rata.
It would mean the likes of Thomas Davis and hundreds of others are not being isolated in dealing with their bank. Would it not be ironic if these banks which are largely controlled by the state, which is the people, would spend billions bailing out the naked self-interest of others, while the one organisation that has always stood for everything positive has to pick up the complete tab for trying to do nothing more than improve their own communities?
It would be obscene for this to happen. Now is an opportunity for some leadership in the GAA to take on the banks and get the same deal as developers are getting, not interest moratoriums or rescheduling, but a write-off on some of the hundreds of millions of capital debt owed around the country. This would create enormous goodwill among the rank and file and would renew spirit in clubs who feel weighed down by this anxiety. Let's hope there is a Roosevelt in the GAA.
- Colm O'Rourke

For some reason I was thinking about ads of my childhood and one that stands out is for the perfume "tr**p" which I think was sold by Lentheric. Or was it Prince Matchabelli ? 

What an incredibly poor choice of name it was for a product sold in Ireland. 

Lentheric has been reborn in South Africa and the marketing is striking. Get laid with this perfume/aftershave.
http://www.lentheric.com/#/hoity/products/
Surely back in the Ireland of the early 80s things were more naïve.   

I saw this about the England cricketers and though there must be something in it for Galway and Waterford hurlers and Mayo fuballers as well as other counties deserving of success after years of heartbreak, last minute goals, bewilderment  and self hatred. 

English cricket spent 20 years in the shadow of of one of the greatest ever cricket teams which was sprinkled with the names of some ni bheidh a leitheid aris ann legends and they had an OLD Meath capacity to get out of jail from impossible situations (they never would have accepted a rugby try to win for example).  England lost the Ashes 8 times in a row between 1989 and 2005 . They couldn't bat their way out of a wet paper bag.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/blog/2010/dec/29/the-ashes-2010-why-england-retained-urn

The coach and the captain
Resource
Selection
Local knowledge
Preparation
Skills
Strategy
Character

Jesus, this is very exciting.  Entrepreneurial interest in the Gaeilge.
And making learning the language fun. What a fantastic idea .

Linking the language to later learning instead of some backwardness. Wow.   

"Studies have shown that encouraging children to learn a new language while young has helped them with their future learning potential. We believe that learning a new language while young should be fun, that's why we created BB to help your young child in learning Irish."

http://www.babogbaby.com/index.php/about/early-language-learning/

The incredible Gugalai Gug CD has sold over 7000 copies. Something is changing.

http://www.futafata.com/Gaeilge/GugalaiGug.html

I think this is a great start but how can the GAA community do more to help young unemployed players ?

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/sport/2010/1217/1224285733700.html

GAELIC GAMES NEWS:  IN AN effort to address unemployment and emigration of young GAA members, the director general of the association Páraic Duffy met the Minister for Social Protection Éamon Ó Cuív last Wednesday before endorsing the "Tús" (meaning "Start") initiative. The FAI and other sporting associations were also present.

As many as 200 GAA members currently unemployed will receive an additional €20 on their weekly social welfare payment of €188 by working as coaches in their local community for 19½ hours a week.
Up to 5,000 people in total are expected to take part in the scheme. As a result, they will be taken off the live register.

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/ocallaghan-to-blow-whistle-on-rampant-coke-use-in-rte-2466623.html?service=Print

Very interesting. Behind the glamour of the drug is a brutal world of gangsters, rape, summary executions and unimaginable violence. 

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/sport/2010/1215/1224285581653.html


GAELIC FOOTBALLERS are three times more likely to be concussed during a game than hurlers. This was one of the main findings of the GAA's injury database presented in Croke Park yesterday, and it proved timely, given increasing concerns about concussion in other sports, mainly rugby.

The database is the product of the GAA's Medical, Scientific and Welfare Committee. Since 2006 it has been gathering information on player injuries, under the direction of John Murphy, and has tracked injury data from 17 intercounty football teams and 16 hurling teams – with 887 football injuries and 671 hurling injuries recorded. For comparison purposes the database has looked at the Australian Football League.

"While the instance of concussion in Gaelic games was largely consistent with that experienced in Australian Rules football," said Murphy, "it's important players, managers and coaches become more aware of what concussion is, its symptoms and signs, the possible side-effects and the guidelines with respect to returning to play. We'll be actively working with teams in the coming months to generate greater awareness around concussion in sport."

Clearly the compulsory use of helmets in hurling across all grades has reduced incidences of concussion. The GAA has produced a position paper on concussion and other injuries (it can be viewed at www.gaa.ie/ /medical-and-player-welfare/injuries/types-of-injury) and reveals cruciate knee ligament injury is the most severe in terms of days lost. Statistics on recurrent injuries showed that allowing significant time for recovery and rehabilitation could have major beneficial effects for players in the long term, particularly in relation to hamstring and groin injuries.

The AFL, Murphy said, had halved their instance of recurrence from between 1997 and 2009 and, he added, through better education and greater awareness among players, coaches and managers, there was no reason why the GAA injury recurrence rates within the same season of 18.2 per cent (football) and 12.8 per cent (hurling) could not be significantly reduced.

The database revealed an intercounty panel spends on average 13 hours in collective training for every one hour of competitive game time. About two thirds of all hamstring injuries in football occur in the second half – and of the players studied, 70 per cent of football participants and 67 per cent of hurlers sustained an injury at some stage during their participation. The most common mechanism of injury is contact with another player, 35.8 per cent in football, 37.4 per cent in hurling.

Also presented yesterday was the GAA's updated position on cardiac screening, following a two-year research programme in which 300 players were examined in an attempt to assess the effectiveness of screening methods.

Reportedly the most effective way to identify risk is for players over the age of 14 to undergo cardiac screening on one occasion. It is also advised this process be repeated before the age of 25.

"The instance of Sudden Cardiac Death in the general populace under 35 is a rare occurrence and remains very difficult to predict," said Dr Danny Mulvihill, chairman of the GAA's Medical, Scientific and Welfare Committee. "No screening programme is 100 per cent effective, but it has been shown to help in identifying risk in the general populace."

The report of the National Taskforce on Sudden Cardiac Death found that less than one in 10 of all instances of the condition occurred while under exertion such as playing football or hurling.

The GAA have defibrillators at all county grounds, as well as over 1,000 defibrillators being purchased by clubs. Clubs who wish to purchase defibrillators can contact Stephen Browne (stephen.browne@gaa.ie or 01 8658685)

INJURIES LIST


1 – Hamstring
(football: 18.2% of all injuries,
hurling: 16.5%)


2 – Knee
(11.6% of injuries – both codes)


3 – Pelvis & Groin
(football: 9.4% of all injuries,
hurling: 10.4%)


4 – Ankle
(9% of all injuries – both codes)


5 – Shoulder
(football: 6.8% of all injuries,
hurling: 6%)


6 – Wrist & Hand
(football: 4.2% of all injuries,
hurling: 10.3%)

The PRC have come up with what looks like a class Christy ring video that covers the period from 1959 to 1964.
Definitely a must buy for all connoisseurs of the world's most magnificent sport and for missionary work in the fuball counties.   

http://peoplesrepublicofcork.buy.ie/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=75&products_id=658

Does anyone know of any DVDs that would have the hurling stuff from earlier on in the 50s, especially the Wexford games?

I bought a book called the Atlas of Irish history recently and there's a map of Ireland in the 12th century with the names of the main tribes by area.

And it is amazing that 800 years later there are fellas from the same families playing hurling and football for the same areas.

Kerry -O Suilleabhain-   Mickey Ned
Clare   O Lochlainn-     Sparrow 
Tipp    Ui Cearbhall -    John
Offaly  Ua Conchubair-  Matt
Wexford Ua Gormain     Larry
Tyrone Ua Neill             Stephen