Sheridan the new kick-fada champion

SEPTEMBER ROAD:THE 2010 football championship has been full of surprise results, especially in the latter stages of the competition, but back in June we believed we had already witnessed the shock of the season when Mayo were dumped out of the championship at Pearse Park in Longford.

Between the posts for the home side that day was Damien Sheridan and he capped a brilliant display by starting the second-half fightback by soloing 45 metres and then passing a ball that Kevin Mulligan pointed.

A fortnight later, Sheridan made brilliant saves during the first half of Longford’s clash with Down in Newry. A controversial penalty for the home side proved the crucial score. Longford’s season ended in July. Next Sunday, Down play in the All-Ireland football final.

The Longford number one, however, has several strings to his bow and at the weekend he became the kick-fada champion for 2010.

Sheridan held off the challenge – at Bray Emmets GAA Club – of Meath’s Paddy O’Rourke with a winning kick of 70.5 metres.

Meath’s Mary Sheridan, whose brother Brian won the men’s title last year, claimed the women’s title with a 45-metre kick.

The inaugural puck-fada title (a side-line cut of 65 metres) was won by Dublin under-21 hurler Kevin O’Loughlin.

No ground for complaints with result

SO HOW come Tipperary supporters stormed the pitch from the stands after winning the under-21 title, but not after claiming the senior?

It might have something to do with the number of stewards that lined the Croke Park pitch and that it is easier for fans to congregate at the bottom of the Thurles stands.

And perhaps it was because, a day after the Liam MacCarthy Cup was handed to Eoin Kelly, Semple Stadium opened its pitch (after some belting rain) for the homecoming celebrations.

Without a second’s thought for the pitch, thousands of families (and hundreds of buggies) landed on the sacred, and sodden, grass, and it didn’t look like it had recovered when Tipperary and Galway faced each other on Saturday.

Not that Galway can use that as an excuse.

If the stadium had any negative impact on the Galway side it was surely because of all the heat emitted by officials in the county in the run-up complaining about the choice of venue.

Joe Canning, now over age for the grade of course, said before the throw-in that it was being used as ammunition for the team.

There’s no doubt Galway can rightly feel hard done by, but the suggestion that their supporters would have travelled in numbers to, say, the Gaelic Grounds in Limerick is laughable.

Those that did travel deserve huge credit for the way they continued to shout for their team throughout the final, despite the game being over as a contest early on, and that the “away” fans were outnumbered by about 20 to 1.

As for the others that didn’t travel because of the venue? It should be noted that Portumna – the stronghold of hurling in Galway – is closer by road to Semple Stadium than Pearse Stadium.