Analysis of the Ireland-Spain game.
We are once more blundering towards exterior darkness. Against Spain we snatched a draw from the jaws of victory and, thereby, stumbled a little further away from the limelight. We will simply have to stop congratulating ourselves on having assembled our best ever squad, and get down to extracting the maximum from our limited ability and, so far, untapped potential.
For Barry McGuigan, arguably Ireland's most talented professional boxer, 1982 is the year when the worst thing imaginable happened. In a London fight in June, McGuigan knocked out a 20 year old Nigerian featherweight, called Ali Mustaffa. the Nigerian boxer fell into a coma shortly after regaining his feet and he now lies clinically dead in a Lagos hospital. Mustaffa has been kept alive only by the functioning of a life support system.
Ireland's first minute collapse against Holland reflected the side's tactical naively and lack of organisation. For this the manager must be held responsible. The Irish European Championship campaign was not even a minute old before it had begun to ship water. Holland's 37 second goal was not produced by a thunderbolt from on high. Ireland were hoist on the petard of tactical ill-preparation. That opening goal was so obvious and could so easily have been prevented.
"D 'ya do much running"
"Did you ever hear of the Dublin Marathon?"
"God, I did."
"Yea, well I won it last year."
Mackey's contribution was in refining crude bobbling and lurching into a practical skill which could be devastating when used by the right man at the right time. He was "The Laughing Cavalier", "The Playboy of Limerick" and "The Happy Warrior". And much more along those lines. Any epithet or cliche that could be used or strained to convey devil-may-care audacity, camaraderie, and abandon has been so used of Mick Mackey.
DICK HOOPER
THE DEFECTION and then reinclusion of Irish marathon champion Dick Hooper from the Irish team for the European Championships in Athens, this month, is but the latest episode in an ongoing saga of distrust and lack of communication between the athhlete and BLE. Briefly here are some of the bones of contention between the two parties:
In the homesteads of the forties and fifties, ritual and reverence surrounded an O'Hehir performance. It was the centre piece of the day. The minute Sunday dinner - distinguishable by dessert - was over, you were warned not to stray too far if you wanted "to be called when Micheal comes on". Never "O'Hehir" or "Michael". Micheal was what himself and everybody else called him in those days.
TELEVISION'S coverage of the World Cup was, in the main, unimaginative. This was particularly so in the analysis of the games during panel discussion afterwards. For the most part the panel discussions were un enlightening and often downright boring. By far the worst was the ITV panel with Jimmy Greaves and Brian Clough being truly appalling.
By Vincent Browne
THIS HAS BEEN A STRANGE and unsatisfactory season for Ireland. Two matches, two defeats is bad enough, but the problem for the Irish team is that there seems to be little that can be done to radically improve its performance. Paddy Agnew on Ireland's 1981 international season.