It’s almost two years since I was last in Ireland; an
unimaginably long period of time to be away from the place on earth where I
feel more at ease than anywhere else I’ve yet come across. Apologies for any
sentimentality, but it’s my spiritual and emotional home. Since my trip to
Cork, Kildare and Croke Park in August 2012 (detailed at http://payaso-de-mierda.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/de-banks.html);
I’ve only spent 2 nights out of Newcastle, on account of family
responsibilities as my mother’s main carer. In addition, as 2013 was deemed to
be “The Homecoming” by Fáilte Ireland,
it was clear I’d have to give anything as conformist as that squalid publicity
campaign a wide berth. Hence, 2014 it was. 40 years on from Rory Gallagher’s Irish
Tour ’74 it was time for me to do the same thing. Even then, trying to
fix a date for a visit, bearing in mind my sporting requirements (see later in
article), was fraught with difficulties. The end of May / start of June window
I’ve used in the past to great effect was discounted because of my candidacy in
the local elections for TUSC and Hibernian’s ability to snatch relegation from
the jaws of safety in the SPL play-off, while the summer had to take into
account my various obligations to attend gigs and games in July and August, not
to mention the wedding of a long-time pal and the occasion of my 50th
birthday. Thanks; nice of you to say so.
Consequently, the weekend identified was, by necessity, Friday
25th to Sunday 27th July, as it would provide plenty of
fresh sporting experiences, both in terms of garrison and indigenous games. I
must take time to add that I did embrace elements of what many would consider a
proper holiday during my stay, bookending the trip with visits to the James
Joyce Museum in the Martello Tower at Sandycove as part of a pleasant wander,
on a beautiful day, from Dalkey to Dun Laoghaire, ideological stronghold of the
heroic People Before Profit Alliance element of the brave and noble United Left
group in Dáil Éireann, and
back, not to mention a considerably more strenuous trip to Wicklow, where an
amble along the seafront was taken to another level entirely by scaling Bray
Head on a baking afternoon. Needless to say, the degree of difficulty was
magnified and multiplied when I lost the easy path and had to scrabble up the
side of the mountain. I thought I was on my way to a grave stone, never mind
Greystones. However, a few great pints of craft ale in The Magpie in Dalkey, as
well as a Druid carry-out, helped to restore my equilibrium. Then, to end
my stay, I took an afternoon’s stroll all along the banks of the Royal Canal
from Maynooth Harbour to the edge of Kilcock, filling my lungs with pure
Kildare air and sensing the ripe disappointment occasioned by the removal of
the Irish Open Canoe Polo Championships to Longford.
Where I didn’t go this time at all was central Dublin,
skirting through it via The Point Depot and Ringsend on the Aircoach
to Killiney Castle, as well as finding €5 under my seat. Sure there’s some great pubs either side of the
river, but once you’ve mentioned the DNS is rough and ready, while the South is
full of bouffant hairdos in YSL shirts, what else is there to say? I’ve done
all the museums and with the temperature pushing 30 degrees, did I really want
to melt on a DART for the chance to waste an hour wandering up Grafton Street? So where did I go this time? Well in
chronological order, I was in the following counties: Dublin, Wicklow, Wexford,
Carlow, Laois, Offaly, Kildare, Meath and Louth, which comprise 75% of the
province of Leinster. This means I’ve now set foot in 27 of 32 Irish counties:
Cavan, Fermanagh, Kerry, Monaghan and Waterford being the only ones I’ve yet to
be acquainted with. Interestingly, an article on staycations in The Irish Times on Thursday 24th
showed that a grand total of 0% of those who had indicated they’d be holidaying
in Ireland in 2014 stated they’d be visiting Offaly, so it was important to be
swimming against the tourist tide. Who needs Kinsale when you’ve got Tullamore
eh?
I’m not sure if it is because the Irish economy has
recovered from the state of abject penury to which the population had been
reduced by failed machinations of the bankers, developers and corrupt Gombeen
men who engineered the property bubble and spectacular crash of 2008, or
whether it was because my travels kept me away from largely depopulated
midlands and western counties that are garishly criss-crossed by a thousand
unnecessary ghost estates that despoil the countryside in counties Longford,
Roscommon and Leitrim, plus many other points, standing as shameful reminders
of the most unacceptable aspects of rapacious greed and the senseless
squandering of both money and hope that lie at the heart of Irish capitalism,
but I sensed that Ireland is no longer in despair and that a corner, while not
being turned, is in sight. Hopefully this won’t translate itself at the next
election into any forgiveness for Fianna
Fáil, as nothing will be surer to set the country further back than that shower
assuming power again. Then again, the market will always be there for
strawberries and spuds, so residents of Wexford and Carlow have no need to put
scores of unfinished, unsaleable, unwanted and unnecessary bungalows across
their fertile fields.
Interestingly, it
happened that politics and sport were intertwined inextricably during my visit,
as we shall see. After I’d identified the central weekend to my visit, I
immediately turned to both http://www.sseairtricityleague.ie/ and http://www.gaa.ie/ to see what entertainment was available
to me. With the GAA, things were simple; having only been to Croke Park, to
twice sit in the Cusack Stand in 2012, I was amenable to anything that was on
offer outside the capital. The choice rapidly became clear; either it was
Semple Stadium in Thurles on Sunday for the hurling quarter final double header
between Limerick and Wexford, then home boys Tipperary versus Dublin, or
O’Connor Park in Tullamore for the 4A football qualifiers involving my beloved
Cork against Sligo, followed by Galway taking on Tipperary. I much prefer
hurling as a game; it is breathtakingly fast, seemingly unspeakably dangerous
and just about the greatest manifestation of Irish sporting culture one could
imagine. Thurles, the place where one Michael Cusack codified the rules of the
GAA in 1884, would provide both an atmospheric location and the necessary
constituent parts of a real event. Unfortunately, many others thought that way
as well; every stand ticket was sold before we could make a decision on how and
whether to get there. In fact, Wexford fans unsuccessfully agitated for the
games to be switched to Croker to enable more of the Model County’s support to
see the game, as headquarters was now idle following the Garth Brooks fiasco.
Consequently, my friend John, whose support for Roscommon meant we had to wait
until the outcome of their game the week before against Armagh (they lost) before
we could make a decision, purchased tickets for O’Connor Park in Tullamore,
from SuperValu
in Maynooth. It may not have been hurling, but at least I was going to
see Cork.
That would be on
the Saturday of course, as the League of Ireland tends to be the Friday night
sporting feature. Looking at the fixtures for the weekend, the prime driving
force was the need to see a new ground. If I’m pressed to name my League of
Ireland team, it would be ex Big Club, Bohemian, who were hosting Cork City.
The Bohs won 2-0, live on Setanta Ireland, which was a great
result, but I’ve been to Dalier twice before so that was out. Similarly,
Athlone, Galway, Longford, Shamrock Rovers, Shelbourne, Sligo and UCD were
non-starters, despite being at home, as they had been previously visited by
yours truly, as well as trips to Bray Wanderers, Derry City, Finn Harps and
Saint Patrick’s Athletic. I’ve not set foot in the grounds of Cobh Ramblers,
Cork City, Drogheda, Limerick or Waterford United, but they were all away.
Consequently, the choice came down to League of Ireland Premier Division
leaders Dundalk against Bray Wanderers (Irish sporting wisdom always holds that
Bray is “a soccer town”) or First Division minnows Wexford Youths against the
singularly uninspiring also-rans Shamrock Rovers B (does it sound better than
Reserves? Moot point…).
It seemed a
no-brainer, but having been caught out by Irish clubs playing in Europa League
qualifiers in 2012, when Cork’s game against St Patrick’s Athletic was
postponed and we had to go on a Leeside pub crawl instead, it was no surprise
when Dundalk were required to go to Hadjuk Split on the Thursday. They
acquitted themselves well with 2-1 victory to go out 3-2 to the Croatians,
while Sligo lost 4-3 to Rosenberg and St Patrick’s Athletic were crushed 5-0 at
a sold out Tallaght Stadium, tenanted normally by Shamrock Rovers, to bow out
6-1 on aggregate. This meant firstly that all Irish interest in UEFA
competitions was at an end, secondly, Dundalk would now host Bray on Sunday
night at the seemingly unreal time of 7pm, thirdly I’d get to see 3 sporting
fixtures during my visit and fourthly, we (John my Maynooth host, Declan who
put me up in Dalkey and I) needed a hotel in Wexford for the Friday night. Again
John came up trumps, by sorting out a room at the Maldron in Wexford, as my
audacious bid to get us somewhere to stay courtesy of the man behind Wexford
Youths had seemingly failed.
Having booked to
go with Aer Lingus, I was delighted by their seemingly helpful flight times,
but irritated by an unexplained 2 hour delay on the outward leg, which a
compensatory voucher for 63% of the value of a Whopper didn’t really
make up for, but at least I got on board a plane. On Tuesday 22nd
July, 58 year old father of four Mick Wallace was arrested with his partner
Clare Daly, formerly of Newbridge, County Kildare, on the runway at Shannon
Airport. After being brought to Limerick Garda Station, the two of them
explained their presence on the tarmac was part of a plan to inspect US
Military Aircraft who land there to refuel and ensure the planes were not
transporting any armaments, as such an act would, in the opinion of Wallace and
Daly, compromise Ireland’s neutrality. A file on the afternoon’s events was
prepared for the Director of Public Prosecutions and the two were let go
without charge.
One
important detail that should be pointed out is that Daly, a former employee in
the catering department of Aer Lingus who presumably knew her way around a
plane and Wallace, a philosophy graduate of University College Dublin, who made
and lost a fortune in the Irish property bubble are both Teachta Dála. Clare Daly, represents
Dublin North as part of the United Left, a broad campaign mainly centred around
the rapidly expanding People Before Profit Alliance, while Wallace, who was forced
in 2013 to pay the Irish revenue a sum of €2,133,708 in respect of unpaid VAT
(presumably as a trained accountant Ms Daly may have helped Mick work out his
complex financial affairs), represents his home town of Wexford in Dáil
Éireann. In the county most famous for the heroic struggles of the United
Irishmen in the 1798 Rebellion against the British occupying forces, commemorated
beautifully in Boolavogue and the affecting Seamus Heaney poem Requiem
for the Croppies, Mick Wallace is a local hero. Despite his tax
affairs, complex personal life and litigious nature, he is incredibly popular
in Ireland’s south east strawberry growing region, where even his atrocious
fashion sense is accepted with an indulgent smile. Wallace still boasts a
shaggy mane of loosely permed peroxided hair that would not have looked out of
place in a soft metal band circa 1983 and insists on open necked pink shirts,
from whence Wexford Youths, the club he founded, adopted their club colours.
When Dundalk’s European adventures meant a trip to Wexford was on the cards, I
sent Deputy Wallace the following email -:
Hi Mick,
I know you're busy with the affairs
of state and, speaking as a UL and PBP supporter, more power to you, but I've a
couple of questions about the Wexford Youths v Shamrock Rovers B game on 25/7.
Basically, I'm coming over from
England for my annual holiday from Newcastle. Each year I try to take in a
different League of Ireland venue. This year I've persuaded my 2 Irish
Newcastle United supporting mates, one from Roscommon based in Kildare and one
from Galway living in Dublin who accompany me to these games, that Wexford
rather than Dundalk v Bray is the place to be. Obviously, we're intending on
staying over; do you have any recommendations for reasonable accommodation,
hotel or whatever, in Wexford? We're only looking for that 1 night stay. If you
can suggest anywhere, to show gratitude I'd like to sponsor the match ball for
the game or something along those lines to help the club.
Sorry if you're too busy to answer,
but I thought I'd drop you a line.
ian cusack
A week or
so later, I got this response -:
Ciao Ian,
Hope all is well. I'm away at the moment but will check out accommodation for you when I get back. You'll be very welcome to the Wexford Youths. Talk soon.
Mick
Sadly, the affairs of state intervened and I had no further
contact from him, so the Maldron it was, after a slow drive down congested
roads in Wicklow, across the Pleasant Slaney, through Enniscorthy and into the
hotel for a shower, a few quick pints and the house special seafood chowder,
before heading up to Ferrycarrig Park for the big game. By kick off, Wallace had
brushed off the residual effects of his afternoon in custody, spent two further
days in the witness box of the Central Court in Dublin while pursuing a private prosecution against
former Justice Minister Alan Shatter for revealing details on an RTE chat show
of a fixed penalty Wallace had accrued for using his mobile phone while
driving, and was secure on his home patch in Crossabeg; doling out
complimentary glasses of red wine at half time, complaining about the first
period performance and generally working the room in his role as founder and ex
officio owner of Wexford Youths FC.
Mick’s
rhetorical imprecations to the assembled guests and friends who hung on his
every word, must have had some effect on the home side, or manager Shane
Keegan’s half time tactical advice may have borne fruition, as the pink shirted
Boys of Wexford, whose motto of 'Life's short, work hard, play hard' is the same as the slogan of Mick’s
firm Wallace Construction, comfortably took apart the uninterested big city hopefuls by a less-than-flattering 2-0 score, while at
the same time Shamrock Rovers first team were losing 1-0 at home to struggling
Drogheda United.
Ostensibly,
the game we watched on a glorious summer evening was between a vanity project
and a glorified reserve team; neither the kind of team one would ever wish to
see in the English pyramid on either sporting or moral grounds. However, it’s
important to remember the disappearance of Salthill Devon and Mervue United from the First
division at the end of the 2013 allowed not only Galway to return, but created
the vacancy that Shamrock Rovers B accepted, simply because they were the only
side willing and able to meet the annual €20,000 League of Ireland membership
fee. That may be depressing, but frankly, Angela Merkel and the European
Central Bank didn’t put the continued existence of football teams high on the
agenda when working out the €64 billion bailout that kept Ireland afloat in
2010, but has reduced the status of the people to economic servitude for
generations to come. In
almost every instance, attempting to view Irish affairs through an English lens
leads to a blurred picture; to fully understand the need for both Wexford
Youths and Shamrock Rovers B in the League of Ireland, you have to grasp the
nature of Irish sporting culture.
While
the presence of reserve teams in the league is not to be applauded, it remains
a necessity in terms of filling the gaps. From what I saw, Shamrock Rovers B
are basically an under 21 team, with young lads going through the motions in
the hope of a call-up to the senior side and very little team ethos in their
play. Meanwhile, a crowd of 297, many of whom wearing Mick inspired pink
scarves and shirts, with a band of about two dozen Wexford Ultras, complete
with flags, drums and a half decent songbook (“Wallace for Taoiseach” being my
favourite) may not represent a club on the verge of a major breakthrough, but
they are in the semi-finals of the EA Sports League Cup, having reached the
final in 2008 only to lose 6-1 to Derry City, and they’re going well in the
league, as demonstrated by Aidan “Roxy” Keenan’s match-winning double, though he’ll
miss the Finn Harps game on August 1st as he’s getting married; I know Donegal’s a
long way, but that’s taking things too far. Most importantly though, Wexford
Youths offer a solid, community-based playing structure for the game in the
south east, with over a dozen junior sides, both boys and girls, as well as a
Women’s team, all bankrolled to an extent by Mick Wallace. Avoiding paying VAT
may be seen as a criminal offence in the UK, perhaps punishable by a custodial
sentence, but in Wexford it is seen as a necessary course of action, because on
the banks of the pleasant Slaney and in the eyes of the FAI, Mick Wallace can
do no wrong. His red wine isn’t bad either…
And
neither were the rake of pints we had, firstly in the appropriately named for
us grieving Newcastle fans, Undertakers (RIP John Alder and Liam
Sweeney) and then in the craft ale paradise that is Simon Lambert’s on South
Main Street, where we met quite a few blokes who’d been to Ferrycarrig that
night and were at pains to state that WYFC are a proper club, rooted in their
community. In a pub that good, I wasn’t about to disagree with anyone.
Previously I’ve always drank black porter on my trips back, but two years away
has seen my palate change and the embracing of craft ales, still a poor second
to real ale but a step in the right direction, afforded a fantastic opportunity
to get hammered in a town I’d never visited before. John opted for the
Corkonian Rebel Red (4%), while I adored the Waterford-produced Dungarvan
Blonde (4.3%) and Declan made inroads with the frightening 6.9% Bo
Brizzle. It was some state we were in that night and the next morning,
where a complimentary cooked breakfast gave us the power to head up country,
all of us heartily agreeing with Pecker Dunne’s statement that Wexford is a
town to like and that one day we will go back, presumably when our travelling
days are done.
With
John at the wheel and the other two of us rehydrating with 2 litre bottles of
water, we drove through Carlow and Laois, taking a brief stop in Portlaoise,
without seeing the famous jail, before arriving in Tullamore around 3.30, as
the atmosphere of expectation surrounding that afternoon’s game began to grow. Attending
GAA games is a very different experience to any game over here. For a start
while there is partisanship; there is also great camaraderie and absolutely no
air of menace. People support their own county and understand their
limitations. Perhaps this explains the presence of Uachtarán na
hÉireann Michael D Higgins, like me in
O’Connor Park for the first time, supporting his native Galway. A thoughtful,
compassionate, intelligent man, he is ideal in this largely ceremonial role and
the spontaneous standing ovation that greeted his walk to his seat was
spontaneous, genuine, unpretentious and essentially Irish. It also doubled the
Galway support at that point in proceedings. While we were there to watch both
games as we were entitled to having paid the €20 entry (Wexford was €10 and Dundalk would be
€15, while the elusive hurling quarter final tickets were €30), there were essentially two crowds around us, as most people who
watched the first left after that, which is when the Galway and Tipp support
arrived. Consequently the gate of 7,837, plus U16s who went free, was never an
accurate reflection of the total number in the 20,000 capacity ground at any
one time.
For
Sligo, this stage of the competition was as far as they could realistically go,
so a large travelling support, the biggest of the 4 competing counties,
regarded this as a festive occasion, as above all else, a GAA game is a family
day out, with all generations present and valued. While I hope I’m not making
this sound like something out of The Quiet Man or a De Valera
out-take, I defy anyone to attend any GAA contest and not feel culturally
improved by the experience. That said, the Sligo lad behind was having a major
nervous breakdown as the Rebels eased past the Yeats County 0-21 to 1-11,
setting them up for a quarter final against Mayo on August 3rd that
they’ll almost certainly lose. However, hurling is the real game on the banks
of the Lee, so the Munster championship and an All Ireland semi-final on August
17th will do for now. Forza Corcaigh!! Rebels Abu!!
While
I was rooting for Cork and bothered only about the result, I did recognise,
ignorant about the GAA as I am, that it was a poor, poor game, disfigured by
“an orgy of hand passing” as the report in the next day’s Cork-based Irish
Examiner (aka De Payper) put it. However Galway
against Tipperary was mental. Tipp don’t really do football as hurling is their
thing, with the Dublin quarter final the next day, but they brought a small
knot of teenage ultras who actually sang at the game. This is incredibly rare
in GAA circles. Dublin fans do Molly Malone and the Rebel Army belt
out De
Banks, but only when they’ve won. Hearing soccer songs from Tipp
teenagers made most of the crowd smile at the incongruity, but they soon shut
up when the Tribesmen got going.
After
going behind 0-06 to 0-04, Galway unleashed 3 unanswered goals either side of
the break, before Tipp pulled one back. A further Galway goal made it 4-14 to
1-09 and the Tipperary choir were on their way home. Suddenly an incredible
late renaissance brought them back inside O’Connor Park, as events on the pitch
reduced Declan to a quivering wreck, before Galway finally won out 4-17 to
4-12. It may not have been the highest standard, but it was damn exciting.
Kerry won’t have too many sleepless nights about a game against the Tribesmen
in Croker though.
Back
in the car, we headed north to Kildare, passing Dowling’s in Prosperous
where Christy Moore first sang with Planxty and a huge Come On You Hammers sign
in Allenwood, showing Premier League sofa and barstool fans are still a
terrible blight on Irish sport. We dropped Declan in Maynooth station, headed
to the house and remained sober that night, as the Wexford hangover was still
in full effect.
Next
day John and I saw the hurling, where Limerick, who’ll play Kilkenny,
humiliated Wexford 4-26 to 1-11. If they’d played that at Croker, many more
Slaneysiders could have shared the embarrassment. Then we caught Tipperary,
Cork’s next opponents, seeing off Dublin 2-23 to 0-16, before heading up
through Meath and Louth to Oriel Park in Dundalk. Our arrival in light drizzle
was heralded by the geographically incongruous Three Pubs in Bohola by
the atrocious Kevin Prendergast at deafening volume over the tannoy, as the
rain grew steadier, necessitating the switching on of the three towering
floodlights that show the location of the ground from miles away. There was no
danger of the pitch cutting up as it’s the only 4G surface in the League of
Ireland and it suits Dundalk’s fluent passing style.
This
game was a qualitative leap from Friday’s fixture, as Dundalk moved 3 points
clear of Cork with a thumping 5-1 win over a Bray side who weren’t terrible by
any means, though that will be of no consequence to their glum, saturated band
of 20 travellers from Wicklow. The skills on the ball, passing and tactics of
both sides were more than adequate, but Dundalk really knew how to finish. The
result didn’t flatter them at all and their fans kept up an incessant barrage
of noise as the rain became torrential. Casual culture does not exist in
Ireland; the economic situation means that spending fortunes on clothing for
football is not a realistic option, though a version of Ultra culture, with
flags, fireworks and drummers (some talented like at Wexford and some atrocious
as in Oriel) exists to create an atmosphere and mark a clear difference from
the sedate GAA experience. However, the clearest difference would be the
numbers watching; while 2,243 at Dundalk was described on RTE radio as “a
packed Oriel Park,” there had been a small matter of 43,088 at Semple Stadium
for the hurling. That, essentially, is the difference between the two sports…
So,
back home with a terrible hangover, a suitcase full of dirty clothes and a
million happy memories, I ponder what’s next for my relationship with Ireland
and Irish sport. The fewer venues I have left to choose from, the harder my
choices are. Ideally the 2015 fixture list will have Drogheda at home on a
Friday night and some GAA pickings on Saturday or Sunday in late May. For the
summer visit, a trip down to Munster would be in order; Cork on the Friday,
Cobh on the Saturday and hurling on the Sunday is the ideal combination, but a
night in Waterford or, as a last resort, Limerick (avoiding Moyross and
Rathkeale) would do just as well.
Thanks!
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