Ian O’Riordan: Nothing beats the desire to play on the big stage

We have seen crazy weekends like this before. The very nature of this business is feast or famine, and no one should act surprised at how our three major field sports have ended up headlining the same big stage, even if Aidan O’Shea might not exactly see it that way.

At least there is no absurd overlap this time: Gibraltar last night, Twickenham this afternoon, Croke Park this evening and tomorrow, then the Aviva Stadium on Monday night – and still time to catch CC Brez headline the Trailer Park stage at Electric Picnic. Sure where else would you want to be?

There is that still apparent absurdity of 165,000 paying spectators coming through the turnstiles of Croke Park within the next 24 hours, without a single penny of it going directly into the pockets of any of the players. This may not be what O'Shea was referring to last Sunday evening after Mayo snatched that Twilight Zone draw against Dublin.

“We have to go back to the day job,” O’Shea said – and it’s still hard to fathom how he’s spent a large part of the last six days before this evening’s replay not resting and recovering but distributing pharmaceutical products.

Professionals

Meanwhile down at Carton House or at the FAI’s new training centre in the National Sports Campus, rest and recovery are a big part of the day. And for any one of those players – all professionals – at least a small part of that time may have been spent checking their bank balance. Sure what else would they be doing?

Much of this, by cosmic coincidence, is the subject of Páirc Life, which airs on RTÉ2 on Tuesday night. Presenter Jacqui Hurley and director Darragh Bambrick point a suitably wide-angled lens on what intercounty footballers and hurlers may be missing out on compared with their professional counterparts.

Hurley brings an innate sensibility to the subject, given her own sporting background, although what Páirc Life ultimately discovers is not without an element of surprise.

“It’s going to go professional eventually,” Podge Collins says in one sequence. “It’s just a matter of when and who makes that happen. I’m sure a lot of players are sitting there thinking, ‘Even the fella selling hotdogs outside Croke Park is getting paid’. And there’s 80,000 people filling the stadium, they all paid €80 a pop for a ticket, and we’re the only ones not seeing any of this money.”

Unquenchable desire

Collins is clearly speaking from the heart, the same heart that chose Clare football this season over hurling, once Davy Fitzgerald delivered his strictly professional ultimatum. Only later in Páirc Life it seems as if this attitude has softened, as Collins is seen recovering from a complete rupture of his left ACL. There is not a whisper of money then: only an unquenchable desire to be back playing.

It’s exactly the same with Mags Darcy, Wexford’s four-time All-Ireland camogie winner, who initially questions her heartfelt commitment after extensive hip surgery ended her season. Only later, it’s as if nothing will stop Darcy getting back to where she wants to be: playing on the big stage.

“Would I love to get paid?” asks Limerick defender Seamus Hickey. “Yes, I would absolutely love to do professional hurling.” Again, he is speaking from the heart and teases himself out loud when wondering how much better a player he might be. Perhaps not as much as he thinks.

Over at Dublin City University, Prof Niall Moyna presents at least some evidence of that. Brian Darby, the Offaly footballer with the famous surname, is subjected to a range of fitness tests aimed at establishing exactly how he compares to his professional counterparts. Indeed Darby is first asked himself what he expects those tests will establish.

“That I should probably be playing rugby for Ireland,” he says with a smile – and he might well be. Everything about his test results indicates a level of strength, speed and conditioning on a par with the paid-up professional.

The backdrop to this subject is that intercounty footballers and hurlers would be better off if they were paid-up professionals too (even if Michael Moynihan, author of GAAconomics: The Secret Life of Money in the GAA, does the maths on why that will likely never be). Still, for some there isn't necessarily a choice, because the increasing level of commitment without some recompense is simply too much.

Commitment

The pictures of Leitrim footballer Emlyn Mulligan setting off on his world trip or of Armagh football Aaron Kernan settling into early retirement certainly question that level of commitment.

“Nobody wants to be the person who is perceived as not being able to give 100 per cent,” says Kernan. “Because you’re always going to find someone else who is willing.”

And yet Stephen Hunt, the Republic of Ireland international, possibly draws the most sympathy of anyone in Páirc Life, when he finds himself out of a professional contract at Ipswich.

“The more money becomes involved, the more bitchiness it becomes,” says Hunt.

GAA director general Páraic Duffy offers perhaps the most pertinent words of all. “This is an amateur organisation and will remain an amateur organisation,” says Duffy, who doesn’t deny the pressure on amateur players continues to grow.

Because by the end of Páirc Life, the issue is no longer about money or professionalism: it's about player welfare and the realisation that nothing beats playing on the big stage.

“Players to a very large extent are divorced from the real world now,” says Joe Brolly, without realising that as long as they remain amateur, they are divorced from the absurdity of it too. Even if Aidan O’Shea mightn’t see it that way.

Páirc Life

is on RTÉ2 next Tuesday at 9pm