Football claims the league limelight
Killinan End
After 56 minutes of their game at home to Donegal last Sunday, Mayo’s footballers were a point behind the opponents. In the context of the broader Division 1 table, they were in dire straits. At that point the relegation candidates were Mayo and Derry with Donegal and Galway, it seemed, heading for the National League final.
The skies darkened further for Mayo when they conceded a late penalty. Colm Reape managed to keep the penalty out and Mayo alive. But this amounted to far more than it originally seemed. Just four minutes and 39 seconds on from the looming relegation for the Green & Red the Division 1 table had been turned upside down. Mayo had gone from relegation fodder to prospective League finalists. Not just that, both Donegal and Galway had dropped out of the final placings with their positions filled by Mayo and Kerry.
To what extent all of this excitement, uncertainty, and flux in the last-day League table was influenced by the new rules and the requirement to adapt to them is an impossible question. There can be little doubt that the preparation of teams was affected by this new learning process. Perhaps this removed some of the usual posturing and “cuteness” that can sometimes be expected over the course of the League. Still early days of course but the two-pointers for shots taken from outside the new arc also kept matches alive. Remarkably there doesn't seem to be much evidence that this affected the number of goals scored. There was a danger that if a two-pointer was achievable the incentive to try for goals would be lowered. Of course, the flip side of that was that presumably the intention behind the two-pointer was to draw out defences and create space inside. Perhaps this aim has been achieved.
It has been traditional, for example, with Jim McGuinness’s Donegal teams for the National League not to be prioritized. That might well be the case and Jack O’Connor referenced the changes Tír Chonaill had made for their last two games as if to imply they still were killed on the League. That may well so, but for a brief time yesterday the county was in a League Final position. It does appear that one way or another a fair bit of what we saw through the course of the Football League is probably a good indicator of what might transpire over the summer months.
Leaving aside the question of authenticity of results and performance it would be churlish not to recognise the value of the excitement generated yesterday. Ciarán Whelan questioned the intensity of it all, but the sheer unpredictability overshadowed this. Indeed, it would make you wonder at the prospect of such a format for the championship where all the better teams were playing each other over the course of a few months with a lot at stake in every round. Any consideration of this must of course acknowledge that a lot of the excitement around the National League is based on the fact one of the teams has home advantage. By contrast the atmosphere in a neutral Croke Park can appear sterile.
The National Hurling League has struggled to generate the same sense of excitement or unpredictability. In a stark difference to the swaying fortunes of the football’s final day, Tipperary entered the last round already qualified for the final, while their opponents were already relegated. Likewise, Wexford met Limerick in a game that would not seal the fate of either in this competition. Maybe there is no way to avoid this and perhaps had the ball bounced differently football’s Division 1 could have ended the same way.
The hurling was defined by the varying nature of the results and the difficulty in noting any specific pattern. Galway were abysmal for much of the campaign and yet they managed a win in Nowlan Park, a feat that was beyond Limerick. Clare were disembowelled by Cork on home turf yet won in what looked a proper encounter in the Gaelic Grounds. It is a story where a moral is elusive. Yet, the League does tend to tell broad truths. Teams that go badly tend to have big hurdles in front of them. Those who do well tend to have a momentum behind them.
Tipperary will have it all to do to emerge from Munster, but they will benefit from having won five games from six in the League and fragile confidence will have been helped, unless the final is a disaster. Clare will not be heartened by the League experience and there will be more riding on their opening Munster fixture at home to Cork than maybe any other team. Despite relegation Wexford will be content that they became increasingly competitive as the League went on while their provincial rivals, Galway, must be more confused than when they started under new management. Maybe in a few months none of it will matter – that’s the fun of it.