Archive News
Footballers wilt in face of Donegal’s determination
Date Published: 28-Jul-2009
ANOTHER day of unpalatable home truths for Galway footballers in the world of late summer championship action as that repetitive message of the last seven years was again drummed home — when the going gets tough, we just can’t hack it, even with the teams on the periphery of the big time.
This should have been a day when Galway sent out a message of intent as to their All-Ireland aspirations, but once more when the intensity of the action hit a certain point on the stress meter, Liam Sammon’s side just did not have the resolve and desire to match that of Donegal.
Again August looms with no trip to Croke Park in the offing for the Galway fans, and while Donegal can take a reasonable slice of satisfaction from their mid-summer recovery, it seems highly unlikely that they have the capability of making a serious bid for All-Ireland glory.
Donegal are one of the teams that Galway should be capable of ‘taking out’ of the championship. Less than four months ago in a league match at Pearse Stadium, Galway had them hammered out the gate at half-time — what has changed so much in the meantime?
It really is all about being able to step up the pace and intensity from the more sedate league action to the white hot heat of championship football . . . whatever is in the current Galway psyche puts a brake in that transition and that’s been true for the latter years of John O’Mahony’s reign as well as Peter Ford’s and now Liam Sammon’s tenures of office. Galway are still playing March football in mid-summer.
When it came to the crunch last Saturday evening in Markievicz Park, the Galway forwards simply didn’t deliver the goods and it wasn’t because of any failure to win a decent share of midfield ball.
For all the justified early season criticism of the midfield sector, in our last two games against Mayo and Donegal, Galway got a decent 50-50 break both in overall possession and from kick-outs.
Galway started out with a ‘big four’ in attack to prise open the Donegal defence — Padraic Joyce, Sean Armstrong, Nicky Joyce and Michael Meehan. Most Galway supporters had reasonable expectations that at least two of those would hit a hot streak of form on Saturday evening.
The reality was that only Sean Armstrong of that quartet delivered the type of display that Galway needed to see them through. Karl Lacey, especially in the first half, completely snuffed out the threat of Michael Meehan; Nicky Joyce could make no headway in the corner while Padraic Joyce, despite a few slide rule trademark passes, just didn’t have the legs to threaten the Donegal defence.
Armstrong, Matthew Clancy (in the first half) and Paul Conroy proved to be Galway’s most effective attackers, but as the game wore on, one defining and ultimately fatal pattern of play for the losers emerged. Time and time again, Galway attackers took the ball into the tackle in the crowded heart of the Donegal defence and almost invariably possession was lost and chances were created at the other end.
It was like a…
People’s living conditions less than 100 years ago were frightening. We have come a long way. We talk about water charges today, but back then the local District Councils were erecting pumps for local communities and the lovely town of Mountbellew, according to Council minutes, had open sewers,” says Galway County Council archivist Patria McWalter.
Patria believes we “need to take pride in our history, and we should take the same pride in our historical records as we do in our built heritage”. When you see the wealth of material in her care, this belief makes sense.
She is in charge of caring for the rich collection of administrative records owned by Galway County Council and says “these records are as much part of our history as the Rock of Cashel is. They document our lives and our ancestors’ lives. And nobody can plan for the future unless you learn from the past, what worked and what didn’t”.
Archivists and librarians are often unfairly regarded as being dry, academic types, but that’s certainly not true of Patria. Her enthusiasm is infectious as she turns the pages of several minute books from Galway’s Rural District Councils, all of them at least 100 years old.
Part of her role involved cataloguing all the records of the Councils – Ballinasloe, Clifden, Galway, Gort, Loughrea, Mountbellew, Portumna and Tuam. These records mostly consisted of minutes of various meetings.
When she was cataloguing them she realised their worth to local historians and researchers, so she decided to compile a guide to their content. The result is For the Record: The Archives of Galway’s Rural District Councils, which will be a valuable asset to anybody with an interest in history.
Many representatives on these Councils were local personalities and several were arrested during the political upheaval of the era, she explains.
And, ushering in a new era in history, women were allowed to sit on these Rural District Councils – at the time they were not allowed to sit on County Councils.
All of this information is included in Patria’s introductory essay to the attractively produced A4 size guide, which gives a glimpse into how these Rural Councils operated and the way political thinking changed in Ireland during a short 26-year period. In the early 1900s, these Councils supported Home Rule, but by 1920, they were calling for full independence and refusing to recognise the British administration.
“I love the tone,” says Patria of the minutes from meetings. “The language was very emotive.”
That was certainly true of the Gort Rural District Council. At a meeting in 1907, following riots in Dublin at the premiere of JM Synge’s play, The Playboy of the Western World the councillors’ response was vehement. They recorded their decision to “protest most emphatically against the libellous comedy, The Playboy of the Western World, that was belched forth during the past week in the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, under the fostering care of Lady Gregory and Mr Yeats. We congratulate the good people of Dublin in howling down the gross buffoonery and immoral suggestions that are scattered throughout this scandalous performance.
For more from the archives see this week’s Tribunes here
Date Published: 23-Jan-2013
SLIGO 0-9
GALWAY 1-4
FRANK FARRAGHER IN ENNISCRONE
GALWAY’S first serious examination of the 2013 season rather disturbingly ended with a rating well below the 40% pass mark at the idyllic, if rather Siberian, seaside setting of Enniscrone on Sunday last.
The defeat cost Galway a place in the FBD League Final against Leitrim and also put a fair dent on their confidence shield for the bigger tests that lie ahead in February.
There was no fluke element in this success by an understrength Sligo side and by the time Leitrim referee, Frank Flynn, sounded the final whistle, there wasn’t a perished soul in the crowd of about 500 who could question the justice of the outcome.
It is only pre-season and last Sunday’s blast of dry polar winds did remind everyone that this is far from summer football, but make no mistake about it, the match did lay down some very worrying markers for Galway following a couple of victories over below par third level college teams.
Galway did start the game quite positively, leading by four points at the end of a first quarter when they missed as much more, but when Sligo stepped up the tempo of the game in the 10 minutes before half-time, the maroon resistance crumbled with frightening rapidity.
Some of the statistics of the match make for grim perusal. Over the course of the hour, Galway only scored two points from play and they went through a 52 minute period of the match, without raising a white flag – admittedly a late rally did bring them close to a draw but that would have been very rough justice on Sligo.
Sligo were backable at 9/4 coming into this match, the odds being stretched with the ‘missing list’ on Kevin Walsh’s team sheet – Adrian Marren, Stephen Coen, Tony Taylor, Ross Donovan, David Kelly, David Maye, Johnny Davey and Eamon O’Hara, were all marked absent for a variety of reasons.
Walsh has his Sligo side well schooled in the high intensity, close quarters type of football, and the harder Galway tried to go through the short game channels, the more the home side bottled them up.
Galway badly needed to find some variety in their attacking strategy and maybe there is a lot to be said for the traditional Meath style of giving long, quick ball to a full forward line with a big target man on the edge of the square – given Paul Conroy’s prowess close to goal last season, maybe it is time to ‘settle’ on a few basics.
Defensively, Galway were reasonably solid with Gary Sice at centre back probably their best player – he was one of the few men in maroon to deliver decent long ball deep into the attacking zone – while Finian Hanley, Conor Costello and Gary O’Donnell also kept things tight.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Date Published: 23-Jan-2013
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