Opening up Croke Park just increased our pride in the place

DARRAGH Ó SÉ WEEKLY COLUMN: DARRAGH O'SEbelieves we have a unique and wonderful organisation that shares out the dream to so many at different levels

I TOOK a look at every game last weekend. There were four winners and four losers but what struck me in terms of the big picture was how the changes in the GAA, even in the period I played, have changed so much for players and fans.

The two main television events first. Meath played well. Big, strong and physical like an old Meath side. Really impressed up front. They have quality forwards. Great to see Shane O’Rourke back in action again. He is a class footballer. One little instant proved the point – he was soloing through, about to be tackled from the right-hand side and without breaking side he was able to switch to soloing to his left. That is a skill not too many players have. He is comfortable on the ball. They have a few forwards like that. They will be happy this week.

Tyrone looked solid as usual. They were probably the team that most people wanted to check on over the weekend. They played well, took the foot off the gas but survived. For the old timers it wasn’t a real test but with Brian Dooher there was one ball near the sideline that he struggled to get to. I’ve been there myself. There is a role for Brian this summer but maybe not 70 minutes of it every day.

I thought for a Tyrone team they played orthodox enough. Obviously Joe McMahon and Martin Penrose dropped back but the rest of the forwards stayed put. Dooher stayed up more than is his norm and that would be no harm in getting the most out himself this year. He is a good finisher and will pay his way.

We won’t know enough about Tyrone till we see them against a big team in a fast open game. On days like Sunday when they can drop McMahon and Penrose back and double up on players they look very well. Against Cork or Kerry the ball will be moved upfield a lot quicker than Antrim did on Sunday. Then you would be concerned about their one-on-ones with defenders. They aren’t noted for their specialised man markers.

Liam Bradley complained afterwards that Owen Mulligan’s goal in the first half came from a foul to dispossess the corner back. If I were Liam I would be more worried about how the last defender back bought a huge dummy from Mulligan (who looked in great shape). The dummy was straight out of the catalogue Owen was using against Dublin a couple of years ago!

Elsewhere, Waterford played some good football but it is hard to look beyond Limerick for the Munster final. The Louth and Longford game was probably poorest of weekend. Mistakes. Poor ball control. Compared to the Offaly game and the Antrim game it was poor stuff.

So four losers. In the days when I began playing county football that would have been the year finished for those players. In the run-up to last weekend though there was a lot of talk about the new Aviva Stadium and the difference it will make for soccer and rugby. We tend to forget the difference the new Croke Park has made for the GAA at all levels. One physical structure has changed the game for everybody.

I remember going to Croke Park for the first time as a player in the 1993-94 league. Ogie Moran was in charge. We’d been in the doldrums for a few years. We played Dublin and they beat us by a point. They were going well at the time and Charlie Redmond I remember got a great goal at the Hill 16 end.

It was a league game, the old Croke Park and it was practically empty. My first time there though and I remember getting a huge buzz. It is a huge occasion in your career when you play there for the first time. Growing up I remember the excitement of just walking into the stand. The old Croke Park on the Hill 16 end there was a right hump in front of the goal there. This isn’t Gallarus but . . . still perfect ground for football.

Not long afterwards they started doing the place up. I played my first All-Ireland there in 1997 and the Cusack Stand had been built. By the time 2000 brought me to my second All-Ireland final they had the bottom tier of the Hogan Stand up. In 2002, when we got their again, the place was finished. It was amazing to play through that.

Since that time we’ve had the place open and brought great international events. I remember last year watching U2 there on a Monday evening with my wife and wondering how they were going to have the pitch ready for the following Monday when we were to play the Dubs. They did though, and it all added to the aura about the place.

Opening Croke Park up just increased our pride in the place as GAA people but there was one other hugely significant move as well which changed things for us all. They opened up Croke Park to the ordinary club player. Novice championships, junior championships, Intermediate championships. If you are small club in any corner of Ireland, no matter how small, you can get to Croke Park with your club.

One of the biggest moments of my career was playing there for the first time against the Dubs. Virtually every player in the country has that opportunity now. Finuge. Ardfert, Foilmore and so on. A lot of Kerry clubs have gone there and got huge value out of it. Men and women have travelled to Croke Park who would never go there to see Kerry.

We tend to knock the GAA and complain about the rules and the pace at which things get done. But in the space of the career I had, which seemed to go past in the blink of an eye, so much changed.

The Croke Park of today is unrecognisable from the place I played in first against the Dubs on that November day and the structures of the games have changed.

Beaten teams wander off into the qualifiers and into the cups and they can dream about getting back to Croke Park before the year is out. And if they don’t every club player in the country can dream anyway.

Antrim and Clare both got beatings on Sunday but so many of the people involved will have been in Croke Park earlier this year with St Gall’s and Kilmurray. The effect of a run to Croke Park spreads out to even smaller and (as we call them) the weaker counties.

At awards ceremonies and other dos you sometimes have the privilege of meeting international sports people from other codes and they always talk about Croke Park with a little bit of awe. It is one of THE venues. And when we talk about the place opening up we always think of it as opening up to international games. Opening it up to ourselves was just as important.

This week in Croke Park the Cumann na mBunscol finals are being played in Croke Park under the eye of Jerry Grogan from Cahirciveen. What a unique and wonderful organisation we have that shares out the dream to so many at different levels.

We’ll be back to knocking the GAA again before the summer is out but for the moment we are at that moment in the summer when Croke Park has yet to hold its first big game of the championship and every club and county is in hustle and bustle mode and everybody has their dream.

Just a moment to appreciate what a great and generous organisation the GAA can be.