Archive News
Old hands help to bail erratic Galway men out of trouble
Date Published: 18-Apr-2012
Galway 0-26
Dublin 2-20
(AET – 0-21 to 2-15 after normal time)
CIARAN TIERNEY AT TULLAMORE
FOR a team which has concentrated so much on youth during a difficult Allianz NHL campaign, it was notable that some of the more senior performers stepped up to the plate in rescuing Galway from relegation in a dramatic play-off with Dublin at Tullamore on Sunday.
After a tepid first half, this tie really came to life as the sides battled it out to avoid the dreaded drop. There really was something for everyone as the Tribesmen had to rescue a draw with three points in injury time before Dublin managed a rousing recovery of their own despite being reduced to 13 men.
Galway’s disappointment at failing to kill off Anthony Daly’s men after both Ryan O’Dwyer and Alan McCrabbe were red-carded in extra time should be tempered by how much they improved after a tame opening period.
Changes, whether enforced or tactical, worked a treat and it’s fair to say that the Galway team which finished this tie looked a lot stronger than the one which started out at Tullamore.
Joe Canning looked rusty after missing the entire League through injury, but his redeployment to centre forward proved to be a master-stroke and he duly responded with ten second half points, including six from play and the three late strikes which brought this tussle to extra time.
Tony Og Regan turned in a masterful performance at centre back, which many would argue is his more natural position, after switching with Fergal Moore while Iarla Tannian turned in a towering performance at midfield after replacing Barry Daly at half-time.
Cyril Donnellan put in a good day’s work after being called in to replace Portumna’s Andy Smith, who aggravated a shoulder injury before the game. In short, the men with experience led the way for what is a very young Galway side.
It might be a cause of concern that Galway failed to register a goal for the third consecutive game but, having said that, Dublin goalkeeper Gary Maguire produced three stunning saves to deny chances for Donnellan and Damien Hayes inside the first ten minutes.
Hayes had opened the scoring for Galway before young Niall Burke pointed a free on eight minutes, following scores at the other end from Dublin free-taker Paul Ryan and full-forward Danny Sutcliffe.
Sutcliffe added his second before Burke and Ryan exchanged scores from frees – and the concession of frees is surely an area Galway must address for the rematch as Ryan had seven points from placed balls by the interval, landing three in a row at one stage.
Points from play from Niall and David Burke reduced the deficit and Donnellan fired over an excellent effort from the left on 27 minutes. Ryan and Niall Burke exchanged scores from placed balls late in the first half and Dublin held a two point lead at the break (0-9 to 0-7).
Tannian’s introduction for Daly revitalised the midfield sector, while
Canning’s switch to centre forward, with Conor Cooney moving to the full-forward role, added clear menace to the Galway attacks.
Canning may have looked short of match practice in the opening period, but he landed a beauty following a good ball from Tony Og Regan in reply to an eighth placed ball from Ryan.
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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