THE LAST POINT: No logic in a new world of gaelic football
THE LAST POINT
Nostradamus was a man fond of a bold prediction or two but not even the French astrologer and seer would have had the effrontery or sheer chutzpah to put pen to paper and predict what has transpired in this inter-county gaelic football season, the latest and, in this writers’ opinion, most bizarre episode seeing Leitrim Ladies suffer a 26 point turnaround in fortunes and exit the Championship last Sunday at the hands of an inspired and almost possessed Roscommon.
Try to figure out how Donegal laid waste to Kerry in their Killarney Fortress only to then lose to a Cork team who meekly surrendered to a Mayo side made look pretty ordinary by Roscommon back in April, the Connacht champions themselves already out of the competition in the quickest possible time! Armagh finally got their hands on the Anglo Celt Cup but fell apart after that, the sages who proclaimed that Galway were the best equipped team to challenge the mighty Kingdom are now wondering if Kieran McGeeney’s side can move with the times and adapt to the new rules?
Whatever about new rules, or the interpretation of them as we saw over a rambunctious Quarter Final weekend at GAA headquarters, the logic of what teams need to do to secure a long run in the championship was turned on its head over the last few weeks – three of the four Provincial champions didn’t make the last eight but the beaten finalists did! Three of the four teams who won byes into the quarter-finals, with the prize of a rest week, all lost and even then, the one that did – Louth – defied all modern day logic by beating Monaghan despite playing 64 minutes with only 14 players!
Capping it all over is Dublin and Louth – when the pair met in the Leinster Semi-Final in late April, the Dubs’ ten point evisceration of the Wee County was greeted as the Jacks are back and Louth gone. But in a roller coaster campaign, Louth have now beaten Dublin, Armagh and Monaghan on their way to reaching their first All-Ireland Semi-Final since 1957 when they went all the way to lift Sam Maguire. I’m not sure if they’ll do that this year but having witnessed their extraordinary fitness levels and outstanding ability, I’d not back against them.
The Dubs, on the other hand, has vacillated between the very good and the very bad, often in the same game. The Hill, for the large part, abandoned them as evidenced by the attendance at the Donegal game but they are back now, momentum is building and a team that looked to be heading for the doldrums after League relegation, a Leinster Final loss and a first defeat at the hands of Louth in over 50 years now stand one game from All-Ireland Final day, albeit Kerry present the most formidable road block imagine.
Kerry are riding that up and down line too – outfought and outplayed by Donegal, riding their luck against Armagh and hugely fortunate after Tyrone last Saturday evening, two or three cruel decisions going against the Red Hand county, Kerry are the sort of team that build to a crescendo the closer they get to the auld cannister as they call it and the smart money is very much on Jack O’Connor’s men.
But my smart money, if I had it, was firmly on Leitrim to get the better of Roscommon last Sunday and so sure was I that Jonny Garrity’s troops would emerge victorious that I headed off to Croke Park to watch the Dubs, presuming that Galway would end Ger Brennan’s maiden season – two big presumptions there I got wrong!
It’s hard to get a sense of what went wrong – reading the report of my colleague Seamus Morris, the one thing that leapt out was the amount of goal chances Leitrim created but failed to take. Against Fermanagh in the final group game, it was this ability to create and convert chances out of nothing that carried the day but against an inspired Roscommon, the shooting went awry and with it, so did Leitrim’s hopes of regaining the Mary Quinn Cup.
That would give the impression Leitrim were authors of their own downfall but that would do a huge disservice to Roscommon – chatting to Willie Donnellan on Monday, he spoke of the Rossies’ intent and focus even as they came into the ground and how they defended with a ferocity and intensity as if their lives depended on it. To put it mildly, they were a completely different team from the one humbled by 22 points in the Connacht Final but the return of a few stalwarts and a good old fashioned revenge mission meant Roscommon were more than good value for their shock win.
Hindsight is always 100% spot on but I didn’t see Roscommon getting anywhere near Leitrim last Sunday, not because the talent is there, it most certainly is, but because they looked so far off the pace, bereft of organisation or resilience on the May Bank Holiday weekend. It is easy to proclaim, hindsight once again, that Roscommon simply didn’t turn up that day so did Leitrim fail to turn up last Sunday? Were they overly confident or did they just endure one of those days where nothing went right and the opposition fed on that energy?
Again, if I’m being honest, I’ve felt that Leitrim never truly hit top form this year and I don’t know why that is but from games against Fermanagh and Sligo in League and championship through to the disappointments against Carlow and Roscommon, my sense was that Leitrim never got the absolute best out of themselves this year and, given the talent at their disposal and the ‘nous’ of the management team, it means that after a season where the long sought, and often frustrated, ambition of promotion from Division 4 was achieved and a Connacht title won, 2026 still feels like an underwhelming season for the Ladies’ county footballers.
That might seem to go against logic but such is the standard they set themselves, I’d put money on the fact that frustration and annoyance is the main emotion in the Leitrim camp when they look back on their season. They’ll ask questions of themselves but the biggest one is will Jonny Garrity be in situ next year? The Leitrim manager has four years done and owes nobody anything but for me, the most urgent question that needs to be answered is will Jonny be back in 2027?