Hope springs eternal, of course, at the start of any new campaign. So, when The Sunday Game Live made its 2025 football championship debut on our screens, Joanne Cantwell asked Ciarán Whelan what his aspirations were for the game in the months ahead, now that everyone has had a taste of the Football Review Committee’s rule-tweaking.
“Trump had his Liberation Day this week,” he declared, “you’d hope this is liberation for football in the GAA this year.”
“Did he just compare Trump to Jim Gavin there?” asked Peter Canavan, but Ciarán categorically denied that he had – all he had noted was his desire for football to be a bit less of a cure of insomnia that it has been of late. Mogga, if you like – Make Our Game Great Again.
Which is what the Football Review Committee (FRC) has been trying to do, so Peter’s optimism about said rule-tweaking resulting in a reduction of snooze-fests was to be expected, him being a member of said committee.
If he’d reckoned out loud that there’d be feck-all improvement it’d have been akin to Trump taking to the Rose Garden to announce that tariffs are a dead loss. Worse, they could stimulate his economy much like some recent Ulster championship games have excited Sunday Game viewers.
[ Are the GAA’s new rules the gamechanger football needs?Opens in new window ]
Donegal v Derry? Not hugely stimulating, but not deflationary either, the chief liberation during the sunny Ballybofey afternoon the freeing of wax from our eardrums by the shriek of that hooter. “I’m nearly deaf,” said Darragh Maloney at half-time, his wax not yet having shifted, but come full-time he’d have been able to hear a pin drop in Greenland.
A 10-point win for Donegal, Michael Murphy’s winning matches again, although he might still be signing autographs in MacCumhaill Park by the time his county take on Monaghan in Clones in a fortnight, judging by the throng that engulfed him.
It wasn’t, to be fair, as one-sided a contest as Leinster’s Champions Cup annihilation of Harlequins at Croke Park. It was, said Fiona Coghlan, “Harlem Globetrotters stuff” of that 62-0 mauling. If it was Bloodgate back in 2009, it was a bloodbath this time around, Harlequins well and truly slam-dunked.
But La Rochelle v Munster? Oh my.
The day didn’t start ideally for Premier Sports, Ryle Nugent’s companions in the commentary box having mic issues: Simon Zebo slightly audible, Benjamin Kayser not at all. To the point where it looked like Benjamin might have to sit in Ryle’s lap to share his mic, which would have been uncomfortable for both men. But frankly, ever since Benjamin said of Scotland’s Blair Kinghorn during the Six Nations, “he spread those long legs of his and absolutely gassed everyone”, you wanted to hear from him.
An iffy start, then, for the channel, but their day pretty much mirrored Munster’s – a dodgy beginning, a middling middle, and a quite glorious conclusion.
[ Munster roll back the years with epic road victory over La RochelleOpens in new window ]
“MUNSTER GET THE PENALTY, MUNSTER GET THE PENALTY,” Ryle hollered when, well, Munster got a penalty just as ROG’s lads were threatening to leave their hearts in smithereens with a late, late comeback. It was a “TOMMY BOOOOOOWE” moment all over again. Simon cackling with delight through it all was a hoot, as was Benjamin gassing in despair, the best moment when French telly labelled Jack Crowley a “demi-d’ouverture”. That sounds more like a ballet dancer than a rugger practitioner, such being the beauty of French, Crowley using his twinkle toes to send over that drop goal.
“And he slots a dagger through the heart of La Rochelle,” said Simon, ROG having a somewhat different view of the moment post-match: “I was thinking, ‘that little f**ker’.”
Epically fabulous. Although the danger of a last-minute penalty for La Rochelle made the conclusion a touch stomach-churning, Ryle possibly ending up in the lap of Benjamin while waiting for the TMO to say ‘nah’.
It’s been an uppy-downy few years for Munster, but Saturday was one of the exceptional days. Their faithful tasked them with a simple enough mission: Momga – Make Our Munster Great Again. That they did. Bigger battles to come, yes, but some of those faithful will be tattooing ‘April 5th, in the year of our Lord 2025’ on their biceps any day now.
