Questions in abundance as hurlers fail to find answers

One step forward, two steps back. That just about sums up Galway hurling over the past two decades and it certainly encapsulates the journey taken under Anthony Cunningham’s tenure to date. In any event, the Tribesmen’s propensity to underperform, underwhelm and under achieve once again reared its head at Semple Stadium, Thurles on Sunday.

If there is any consolation, at least, you could see this coming. Let’s call a spade a spade. Galway’s campaign in 2013 has been nothing less than a shambles from Walsh Cup to National League to Leinster Championship to the All-Ireland series and, yet, blind faith had us hoping that it would all fall together miraculously in the next outing.

Well, there are no more outings in 2013 and in a year when there is an All-Ireland title up for grabs – with recent winners Kilkenny and Tipperary out of the equation – Galway have failed miserably to get their house in order to challenge for the coveted prize.

Of course, the blame game begins now. Some will look for Cunningham’s head on the platter; others will muddy the names of the players, collectively or individually, fairly or unfairly; and a few will probably seek to delve deeper and surmise about unsound structures and other matters. And so, the vicious circle continues. Plenty of questions but no answers.

As for last Sunday, it was like playing that old, scratched record and the tune was as familiar to supporters of the maroon and white as the sound of the fiddle has been to Clare people. In another high profile game, Galway were flat, lacked intensity and just couldn’t get to the pitch of championship action.

Indeed, once Conor McGrath netted the Clare goal on 23 minutes, following a blistering run from Tony Kelly, it was almost a stretch of the imagination to see Galway digging themselves out of this particular hole given, traditionally, they rarely win these contests if they don’t dictate the pace from an early stage.

And pace was something that the Tribesmen were in short supply of, which was mind-boggling given this has been what Galway minor, U-21 and club hurling has been built on over the past two decades. It was what the Galway of 2012 was built on.

Yet, on Sunday, the majority of the Galway players couldn’t raise a canter and, to some extent, you would have to question what they were doing behind closed doors in the run-up to this game. Certainly, it couldn’t have been putting a game plan together because if so – and not for the first time this year – it failed utterly to materialise on the field.

In 2012, returning to this reporter’s bugbear, Galway had established an exciting and successful style of play which was complemented by a team that was balanced with the right players in the right positions. The result: An All-Ireland final appearance.

However, inconceivably, the management abandoned that line of thinking over the winter and decided they would reinvent the wheel. As a result, there was no clear cut vision for 2013 – at least, not that was apparent, not even to the players – while right throughout the campaign players were being moved from one position to the next. Consequently, few players had a clear role going forward and this manifested itself in a string of disjointed displays, this one included.

In addition, Galway entered no championship game with a settled team, underlined by the fact that goalkeeper, full-back, centre-back and midfield were all changed coming into this pivotal fixture. While changes were needed from the Dublin debacle, they had to be the right changes. The measures introduced against Clare only went halfway and hurling is a game of all or nothing.

So much so, Galway looked like a team formed out of compromise – in that if a player hadn’t nailed down one position he was inducted into another – and a case in point was the selection of Niall Burke at corner forward. It didn’t work against Dublin and it didn’t work against Clare.

That is not to say Niall Burke shouldn’t be on the team. The Oranmore/Maree man, although a work in progress, held down the centre forward position to great effect last year and that is where he should have featured. If Conor Cooney was going better, then he should have got the nod.

All in all, the management – and we keep saying ‘management’ because that is what the Cunningham, Mattie Kenny and Tom Helebert trio has been sold as – lost its edge and this was no more underlined in the opening half against Clare.

 That said, Anthony Cunningham, who is an honourable, decent and knowledgeable man, should be the manager in 2014 – underlining the word ‘manager’. Hurling is not a democracy and the three-pronged management approach has run its course.

The running joke in the county over the last number of months has been ‘who is the manager?’ and that has unjustly undermined Cunningham’s position and sent out mixed messages to all concerned, fuelling uncertainty. No more than the players in the panel, roles have to be defined and everyone works to the template.

There needs to be one voice and one vision – as was evident in 2012 – and not over-complicating structures, the style of play and everything else. Yes, have a game plan – that’s an integral part of the modern game – but remember the key to hurling is grounded in its simplistic and fuelled by an insatiable work-rate, hunger and desire.

That’s nothing we have not alluded to before. Hopefully, someday, the penny will finally drop.

For a detailed match report and further reaction an analysis see this week’s Sentinel or Connacht Tribune