Galvin affair goes where no man has gone before

Sideline Cut: THE TROUBLE for Paul Galvin certainly began when he took momentary leave of his senses last Sunday but it was pitched into another dimension on the television that night.

The Sunday Game is a part of the summer championship ritual in this country and patrons don't like to see much tinkering going on. The decision to bring back the old anthemic theme tune seemed to be an acknowledgement of this by the chiefs out in Montrose.

But then they went and destroyed it by ordering in the kind of furniture that Captain Kirk used to sit on when he was manning the Starship Enterprise. It may well be that modern Ireland has become too hip for its GAA television presenters to talk goals, points and melees from behind the traditional desk.

But the new TSG furniture is so blatantly and aggressively cool that even the likes of Puff Daddy or LL Cool J - both of whom are booked to moonlight as guests during the football qualifiers - would find being there intimidating.

And it has taken its toll because not only has it been a lousy start to the football All-Ireland, it has been seriously dodgy for The Sunday Game as well. It should be acknowledged that there are still many people who have not forgiven RTÉ for removing Michael Lyster from the 'hot seat' of Sunday evening sports entertainment. It remains a baffling decision. Walk into many good Catholic houses along the Western Seaboard and in the hallway you will find portraits of the big three - Pope John Paul, JFK and Michael Lyster.

To compound matters, RTÉ decided to replace him with their most controversial panellist, Pat Spillane, who, on his game, was a motor mouth and great fun. As the GAA's Gay Byrne, he is a more stilted performer. More problematically, he is one of the most decorated and famous football players from the most famous football county of them all. And on Sunday last, he was directing the nature of the questions about the dismissal of Paul Galvin to another famous Kerry football player, Dara Ó Cinnéide.

Like Anthony Tohill two weeks previously, Cinnéide found himself in the thankless and impossible position of being expected to comment on and, in truth, castigate the actions of a former team-mate and, for all the public knows, a friend.

It was ironic that two of the most straight talking and informative guests on the show had to sidestep the most burningly controversial issue of the week.

It has become clear that it is unfair on guests and maddening for the viewers when TSG puts panellists on to analyse games in which the teams they used to play for are involved. That cannot happen any more or The Sunday Game will fast lose credibility.

There is not a single person in Ireland who would have responded any differently than Dara Ó Cinnéide did last Sunday night. He did declare that Galvin was wrong to slap away referee Paddy Russell's notebook and - perhaps too hastily - pointed out that the Finuge man has only been sent off once in his championship career.

By Monday, Galvin had appeared on an RTÉ six o'clock news interview, where he appeared genuinely contrite and devastated that his season - and the honour of his captaincy - had taken this dramatic and disastrous turn.

The Kerry county board weighed in behind their man as did former Kerry greats and, judging by the various phone-in shows, the sense that a Kerry machine was cranking up to get their player off the hook created considerable resentment in other football counties. The most commonly asked question seemed to be: would there be this kind of fuss if it were a player from our county?

The answer is no. But there is a flip side to that question. Has any Gaelic football player been subjected to such public notoriety as Galvin has had to deal with in the past six days? There has been more talk about the Kerry captain this week than there has been about the property deeds of the former Taoiseach at the tribunal.

If a referendum was held on the Paul Galvin suspension, the turn-out might beat the Lisbon poll. Jack O'Connor, the man who brought Galvin onto the Kerry team, is right to complain that Galvin has been demonised since last Sunday. For sure, Galvin is confrontational and seems to court unpopularity. He plays with an on-the-edge intensity and because most of us just see him on television or in Croke Park every summer, it can feel as though he is public property, there to be dragged down. But there is an uncomfortable feeling about the way he has been held up as some kind of comic-book bad boy this week to the extent that his life as a teacher, as a coach and as a normal person has been violated and his sporting and personal reputation has been ruined. And he does not deserve that.

You can argue that he brought it on himself; that with representing his county - and captaining the Kingdom - came a duty to control his wilder impulses. It is also true that the referee is sacrosanct (although watch how many players curse at the referees when they are whistled for a foul this weekend: when is that going to become unacceptable?).

But put yourself in his shoes. Galvin is one of those ball players who care almost too much. The captaincy, the lay-off through injury, his intense desire to get back into his game and the likelihood that the Clare boys were probably goading the life out of him all shortened his fuse and the prospect of a second yellow card lit it.

He may well have been booked in the wrong. And the news that he had participated in a now doomed television advert with the referee, Paddy Russell, is not insignificant.

Flicking the notebook away was more an act of outrage than intimidation and his dash across to remonstrate - or plead - with the linesman was clear proof that he believed he was being more sinned against than sinning - again. You have to wonder if the incident would have merited such a strong disciplinary response had it not been captured on television. But it was and it looked terrible and now Galvin has been left feeling wretched. His absence will become a cause for his team-mates but they are going to miss his devilment and attitude and, it should be remembered, his skill, when it matters this year."It has become clear that it is unfair on guests and maddening for the viewers when TSG puts panellists on to analyse games in which the teams they used to play for are involved. That cannot happen any more or The Sunday Game will fast lose credibility