KILLINAN END - Is hurling now a forward’s game?

 

Elite sport has found a way to keep its head above water in the current climate.

At professional level this has been achieved by means of ‘bubbles’ where people move in a specified circle of people only. In the GAA there seems to be a more ‘wing and a prayer’ approach and the All-Ireland championships have been formatted as to leave little enough room for slippage if self-isolation is a factor. Offaly’s hurlers have fallen victim already and outbreaks in any team setting as the championship runs down is the nightmare scenario for the GAA leadership. One thing the GAA does share with professional sport is the crowd-free aspect. The significance of this, apart from revenue-generation, is beginning to become a talking point.

English soccer’s Premier League is one of the most crowd-influenced sports you could imagine. The advantage of home and away is well-accepted. Take, randomly, the 2018-19 season - Tottenham Hotspur lost 13 matches and West Ham lost 16 from 38. Both teams lost just three of these at home. It is likely that this divide between home and away fates is evident across all teams whether successful or not – they expect to do better in front of their own fans. Many will wonder if this will be altered by the lack of fans and time will tell on that one.

SxA trend that is emerging in the current season is a remarkable amount of goals. In the first 38 games of the season there were 40 goals more than the same stage last year. The average goals per game is the highest for 70 years. Several other measures take you back to old God’s time for parallels. The explanations inevitably revolve around the changes wrought by lack of crowds and how that changes the atmosphere. Some observers claim that defending is less aggressive and forwards are less inhibited about making mistakes. 

Watching the hurling championship last weekend, you have to wonder if hurling is going the same way. As Limerick and Clare ebbed towards half-time the Banner county trailed by 0-15 to 0-14 – the same scoreline at the end of 70+ minutes between Tipp and Clare after an intense encounter in Páirc Uí Chaoimh just 19 years ago. Limerick had raised just two white flags less than they managed last year against Kilkenny. Clare won the 1995 All-Ireland final with fewer scores than they had at half-time last weekend.

There is no doubt that scores have increased hugely in the recent years. The greatest sense of this is what losing teams are managing. One match report referred to the “worrying” amount of scores Dublin conceded against Laois (0-23). Yet it bothered nobody when Laois conceded the exact same score last year when beating Dublin. Cork scored 1-40 against Westmeath last year but conceded 0-20. With the lightness of the ball and the ability of players to score from nearly any distance, the amount conceded by winning teams in matches is now probably irrelevant. It is not necessarily a sign of defensive weakness, more an indicator of how the game is now played.

Like our sporting counterparts in English soccer we may now have to consider the role of empty stands and terraces. Dublin scored 2-31 against Laois on Saturday evening and it looked like it would be hard to top that at any stage of the championship. It was already one of the highest scores in the history of the championship. Its altitude lasted less than 24 hours. The Clare-Limerick game was producing nearly a score a minute while the winners hit even more points than Dublin.

Not that this matters a whole lot in the greater scheme of things - but current trends render all scoring records meaningless. Free-takers, on a good day, could hit 13 or 14 points from placed balls. When John Fenton hit 0-12 in Thurles in the 1987 Munster Final and went one better in Killarney a week later it was considered an almost freakish achievement. By the looks of things, it might be the exception rather than the rule in this year’s championship. Quite what value that level of scoring adds to the game is another matter. But it is fair to say that at a scoring rate of nearly point a minute, with the associated puckouts and delays around the awarding and taking of frees the amount of time when the ball is being really closely contested in such games is limited. Perhaps now players can be less cowed by big match nerves because they are effectively hurling under laboratory conditions.  

Kilkenny and Tipperary face an extra challenge this weekend. Both play their first competitive games against teams which have a game under their belts. Down the years that has not always been such an advantage though it might seem obvious that it should. This year, of course, is different for all sorts of reasons. For Tipp, however, it is a daunting challenge facing such a formidable team with a free-scoring performance like that behind them. Yet they will face into the game safe in the knowledge that life might not be difficult in defeat anyway. There might also be a sense that beating Limerick twice might be difficult too. Several reasons for the pressure to be lessened. The lack of Limerick’s baying hordes on the terraces will play its part too.