Archive News
Kilkenny show they still have the stomach for battle
Date Published: 01-Aug-2012
SEANIE Tobin had just equalised for Limerick with a rousing score seven minutes into the second-half. Their supporters were sensing a shock, especially as the Shannonsiders also had the wind behind them. This was the crisis moment for Kilkenny. Had they still got the stomach for battle after all they have been through; all they had won? Over the next ten minutes, the Cats gave an emphatic response.
Having been unexpectedly routed by Galway in the Leinster final, Kilkenny were in unfamiliar territory with their aura of invincibility shattered. The fit again JJ Delaney and Michael Fennelly may have returned to their ranks, but centre back Brian Hogan was an injured absentee, while the team’s confidence had to be shaken by events in Croke Park in early July. In the other corner was a young Limerick team on an upward curve.
It was now a major test for Kilkenny in more ways than one and early in the second-half at Thurles last Sunday, there was no guarantee that hurling’s greatest ever team would come through it. Everything was on the line, but the All-Ireland champions simply rolled up their sleeves and upped the ante to such an extent that the match was over heading into the final quarter. When they needed it, the players had the resolve, quality and commitment to turn the match on its head.
There had been a general anticipation that Kilkenny would be so revved up after their humiliation that they would blow Limerick away in the opening 15 minutes, but that never happened or even threatened to occur. Some of their players appeared out of sorts, as evidenced by poor touches, inaccurate free-taking and untypical hesitancy. In fact, it was Limerick who made the more compelling start with David Breen’s well executed 12th minute goal no more than they deserved.
Yet, it was already evident that their backs appeared vulnerable on the breaking ball and there was also a certain naivety, especially in the team’s full back line, in relation to being sucked out of position. Limerick were made pay for it too with two critical goals from Henry Shefflin, who also picked off a brace of points in the opening 20 minutes at a time when many of his team-mates hadn’t yet got to the pitch of battle.
Another Kilkenny stalwart Tommy Walsh, who had a really troubled 70 minutes in the Leinster final, was clearly in no mood to experience a similar trauma against Limerick. He thundered into the match at wing back and picked off a rousing long range point when his team needed it. Walsh and Shefflin were Kilkenny’s key performers in the opening-half and, underlined once again, their greatness when the pressure was on.
Trailing by only 2-7 to 1-9 at the break, Limerick’s tails were up with the elements to come, but after Tobin had equalised, they were hit by a Kilkenny blitz which yielded 2-5 without reply. Few saw it coming which made it even more noteworthy as Aidan Fogarty and Colin Fennelly, two players who considerably raised their game in the second-half, both beat Nicky Quaid from close range after the opposition defence was marked absent.
Fogarty (two), Fennelly and Shefflin (two frees) landed the points in this period of utter Kilkenny dominance to leave them leading by 4-13 to 1-12 after 54 minutes. From a position where it appeared they might be beaten, the title holders just met the challenge head on to ruthlessly expose Limerick’s limitations. It was a lost cause for John Allen’s men after that and not even Richie Hogan’s red card for a reactionary pull across Tobin on the sideline underneath the old stand, was going to alter that scenario.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
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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