Busy season beckons for Westmeath’s flagship teams
Can it really be two decades since the late, great Páidí Ó Sé arrived from Ventry to mastermind Westmeath’s historic Delaney Cup win?
Well, whether we like it or not, we are all 20 years older, greyer and/or balder than when the eight-time Celtic Cross winner, with the invaluable aid of fellow-Kerryman Tomás Ó Flatharta, got that precious ten per cent extra from a talented squad which had been meticulously assembled by his predecessor Luke Dempsey (whose contribution should never be devalued) to enable David O’Shaughnessy to lift ‘the canister’ (Páidí’s term) in Croke Park on Saturday, July 24, 2004.
Páidí’s reign started with a memorable O’Byrne Cup campaign, his appointment ensuing record crowds in Cusack Park up to and including the final against Meath. Indeed, the massive attendance for said decider invariably comes up in January when Gaelic games action is confined to the unfairly-maligned pre-season tournaments and scribes nationwide attempt to hype up such matches.
What is also trotted out with monotonous regularity, this trotter (from Mullingar as distinct from Peckham!) an annual guilty party, is Páidí’s take on the O’Byrne Cup: “It’s an opportunity to blow out some dirty petrol.” Ironically, 20 years since he uttered this opinion (correct at the time), the mind-boggling increase in the demands on amateur players would suggest that there is very little dirty winter petrol in the tanks of modern inter-county players, whose sacrifices are now more or less in situ for 12 months of the year. My admiration for them is enormous, especially as perhaps 90 per cent of football counties and 50 per cent of competing hurling counties haven’t a snowball’s chance of lifting Sam or Liam respectively next July!
For all the criticisms of the pre-season competitions, diehard fans are always delighted to see their heroes in action in January. Sadly, the Westmeath fan base is extremely small (except when success arrives in their absence). Accordingly, we can expect to see the same old faces in Parnell Park this Thursday evening (January 4) and two days later, Saturday (January 6), in Glennon Bros Pearse Park, as the hurlers and footballers face Dublin and Longford in Walsh Cup and O’Byrne Cup action respectively. This year’s two tournaments are sponsored by Dioralyte, dare I politely suggest a product likely to have been used over the festive period by many in attendance – hopefully, not the players!
In football, the O’Byrne Shield ensures a second game for first round losers, while in hurling three groups of three teams is also a guarantee of a minimum two games. Give out about the tournaments all you like, but they are surely infinitely better than meaningless challenge matches.
As ever, managers will be hopeful that they can use these matches to unearth a player or two fit to hold down a place in the National Leagues. The latter are now more important than ever, particularly in the big ball game, and they start for Dessie Dolan’s troops on January 28 with a very tricky assignment in Tullamore, and for Joe Fortune’s charges with a massive task against Galway six days later in Salthill. To add to the overall difficulty, both sides have more away games than home.
Dolan’s target is to gain promotion from Division 3 (ideally, winning the final for good measure). Anything less will be considered a failure. It’s as black and white as that. Fortune will hope to be competitive against three of the small ball’s top teams, before finishing off with two slightly less daunting challenges.
The ‘split season’ has come in for a lot of stick since its introduction two years ago, but it is what it is for now, and pretty much non-stop action is set in stone all the way to the end of May (at least). Loyal supporters will have to toss a coin on our traditional national feast day (sorry, St Brigid you have a bit of catching up to do on your male counterpart!) as both sides are in action on St Patrick’s Day. Indeed, it would be lovely to think that both teams will be going very well at that stage, thereby making the coin toss a difficult one.
The following is a chronological list of guaranteed senior hurling and football fixtures (weather permitting) for Lake County fans to pencil into their maroon and white diaries.
January 4 (Thursday), Walsh Cup, away v Dublin.
January 6 (Saturday), O’Byrne Cup, away v Longford
January 13 (Saturday), O’Byrne Cup/Shield, home/away v Meath/Louth
January 7/14 (Sunday), Walsh Cup, home v Antrim (date depends on result of Dublin game)
January 28 (Sunday), NFL, away v Offaly
February 3 (Saturday), NHL, away v Galway
February 4 (Sunday), NFL, home v Clare
February 11 (Sunday), NHL, home v Limerick
February 18 (Sunday), NFL, away v Wicklow
February 24 (Saturday), NHL, away v Tipperary
February 25 (Sunday), NFL, home v Limerick
March 3 (Sunday), NFL, away v Antrim
March 9 (Saturday), NHL, home v Antrim
March 17 (Sunday), NFL, home v Down
March 17 (Sunday), NHL, away v Dublin
March 24 (Sunday), NFL, away v Sligo
April 20/21 (Sat/Sun), Joe McDonagh Cup, home v Kerry
April 27/28 (Sat/Sun), Joe McDonagh Cup, away v Offaly
May 4/5 (Sat/Sun), Joe McDonagh Cup, away v Down
May 18/19 (Sat/Sun), Joe McDonagh Cup, home v Meath
May 25/26 (Sat/Sun), Joe McDonagh Cup, home v Laois
*A date and venue for the Leinster SFC game (probably at home, in early April) versus Wicklow has not yet been fixed.
The late Dessie Hamm
Lake County Gaels of a certain vintage were saddened by the news of the death on Christmas Day of Dessie Hamm, who was regularly used as a sub (including the heavy All-Ireland final loss to Kerry) during the Westmeath minor footballers’ fantastic campaign in 1963. Unfortunately, Dessie was unable to attend a very special Golden Jubilee function which I was privileged to jointly-organise with the late Paddy Buckley in November 2013. Despite having lived in Clondalkin for many years, Dessie’s funeral was fittingly held in the Carmelite Church in Moate on New Year’s Day, prior to his burial in Ballymore Cemetery. May he rest in peace.