IN ALL FAIRNESS - Special day on Nore-side

Croke Park is the mecca for Gaelic Games, but it doesn’t mean it has to be the venue for every final, and last Sunday’s All-Ireland Minor Hurling final was a perfect example of that.

First of all, if given the choice, the players of Tipperary and Offaly would have preferred to have played in Croke Park. Who wouldn’t! It is where every player wants to play, be it for their club or county.

However, minor semi-finals and finals were always overshadowed by the senior game at Croke Park, where only a small proportion of the crowd were interested in the minor game and there is little or no atmosphere to speak of. Last Sunday in Nowlan Park was so much different as you had over twenty thousand people there just for the minor match, in a smaller venue, and it made it feel much more special than any day out at Croke Park, and it was interesting to hear former Tipperary All-Ireland winning minor captain Brendan Maher to say that on the Sunday Game.

When changing the minor grade from under 18 to under 17, the plan always was to take the semi-finals and finals out of Croke Park, and even away as curtain-raisers from provincial games. The two Covid impacted years provided the opportunity for it to happen as only one match per venue was permitted, with the delayed 2020 and 2021 finals taking place in Semple Stadium.

The occasion at Nowlan Park last Sunday as something special altogether. It was akin to the 2013 All-Ireland Qualifier between Kilkenny and Tipperary. I pulled up outside UMPC Nowlan Park on Sunday at 11.15am, and people were already queuing at the turnstiles to get the prime seats for a game that wasn’t due to start until 1.30pm. There’s no doubting that the special occasion it was, was largely due to Offaly being involved. They are a county craving a return to the big time and they see this minor team as being the one that will start the renaissance in earnest. I would doubt that if any other county were involved would you have had the interest levels and demand for tickets there were for this game.

However, even if you got a crowd of, on average, 10,000 for a minor final going forward, it would still be better in a smaller venue like Nowlan Park, than the vast venues such as Croke Park or Semple Stadium. I’d even go far as to say maybe Nowlan Park should be considered as the permanent venue for All-Ireland Minor finals going forward, bar the years Kilkenny are involved, as much like Thurles, it is relatively central to all the major hurling counties.

Thankfully, the concerns over whether Nowlan Park would be able to cope with the anticipated crowd proved to be wide of the mark as the attendance of 20,214 fell well short of its 27,000 capacity. If there is one lesson that needs to be learned going forward for Nowlan Park, as happened in 2013, there needs to be assigned seating for anyone purchasing a ticket, to allow more flexibility for the supporters to arrive at a time of their choosing, rather than over two hours beforehand just to get a good seat. Secondly, I wouldn’t be surprised if the GAA shut down the ticket sales last Thursday evening for fear that they wouldn’t be able to cope with the number of under 16s that were coming as there was no way of knowing how many there were. It meant many people, both young and old, were denied the chance of going as the ground could have catered for another six thousand people.

Bill moves on

The Tipperary senior camogie year was summed up last Saturday in that they beat Cork for the first time in the championship for fourteen years, but it still wasn’t enough for them to progress to the All-Ireland series.

For the last five years, Tipperary had always fallen short against the Big 3 of Galway, Kilkenny, and Cork, and the first time they managed to lower the flag of one of their rivals, is the year they miss out on the knockout stages. However, Tipperary’s fate in the championship wasn’t decided last Saturday in Pairc Ui Rinn, as they missed out to Dublin on score difference, it was earlier on in the campaign where the damage was done, particularly the first-round draw at home to Clare where they had enough chances to win, and with those two extra points on the table, it would be Tipperary in the quarter finals.

No one has given as much to Tipperary camogie over the last decade than Bill Mullaney, firstly as minor manager, winning an All-Ireland title in 2016, and then over the last five years as senior manager, reaching four semi-finals in row, but getting to the big day was always a step too far, despite getting closer each time. He steps aside with Tipperary in a much better place than they were when he started. They might have taken a step backwards this year, but they remain as close as ever and if some key players return next year, and hopefully a new manager bounce, 2023 could be a big year for camogie in the county.