And thankfully, massive scorelines, which was a thing not, uh, seen a couple of years ago.

No, and the, I mean, you, you look at the, I have kind of a wish list of what I want from a, from a county final, and part of it is the quality on the pitch, and then part of it is the, the occasion, the, the, the bands, pipe band beforehand, the crowd itself.

If you can get a local rivalry, if you can get a couple of intercounty stars involved, too, so it'll, uh, exaggerate the whole thing all the more.

And we're just very fortunate that we have so much of that now.

So when you think about the weekend we've had and the weekend that's coming, it's, um, it's a pretty g- good time to be a GAA fan.

Yeah.

You had a brilliant final in Wicklow, a replay in Leitrim.

Uh, Tullamore winning four in a row in Offaly.

There's no point in saying otherwise and I think it's where you have to give the massive credit here to the County Board to pull this off.

100% yeah and I would just add like Navis Morris had I think 25 years between playing he was involved in a selector under Jack O'Connor and then managing with Kerry so he gave his heart and soul to that I should be said that even in recent years he did incredibly well when FOSA David Clifford's club won their previous silverware he was involved there and he they got to crow park and then got them damn near close to getting to a senior club which is no mean thing in in kerry um and then he took over fingu his own club and they had their own success this year as well so he's been obviously still very associated with football in terms of a couple of different factors the fact that he's um he was involved with the frc and the amount of people that he met through that the rte and his punditry work and then obviously most importantly the irish examiner um but you know beyond that i just think the fact that uh um it's a guy who you know an ireland winning manager a guy who a huge amount of people will have huge respect for i imagine if it was players on the fence or draw i'd say there's a huge like excitement about the prospect of working with someone like this so and that's not to mention whatever whatever ticket he takes with him as well so yeah just just it's just a really positive note paul and that doesn't guarantee anything it won't last forever but at this point it's a nice thing to have what kind of a manager do you think going again I'd say probably more cutting than people realize.

He has this...

What was that? Absolutely ludicrous Sunday Independent line about the Father Tide character or...

You know, he has a certain delivery and a certain style from a punditry perspective.

But I'd be reasonably confident if...

I would know if he needs to... give it to someone between the eyes he's more than capable of doing that and if you're in you're going to be you're going to be 100% in uh he's got a certain outlook on football which you've actually you saw that but you know he probably associated with the 2014 Kerry success and Kerry got some breaks that year absolutely I would say actually especially in 2015 they probably didn't get as many breaks so these things there's a give and get with that and you could actually argue in 2016 and the Dublin game that day too there was a couple of hits laid on there that um if they were looked at differently he could have been a multiple Ireland winning manager but he I'd say is that kind of progressive enthusiastic wants has a very clear vision of how he wants the game to be played I'd say through the FRC some of the stuff that he would have been strongly campaigning for was things like the three up or stuff like that because he just has you know, for who he is and where he's from, he has a version of the game in his mind.

There's obviously a lot of rumours starting, but as you mentioned there from the outset of the pod, this, I suppose, getting the backroom team together and getting the right backroom team together here is crucial for Fitzmaurice.

Maurice, are there any protocols currently in place? And I suppose, what are the GAA looking to see here?

There are loose protocols in place in regards to how players have been recruited for the last maybe 10 to 15 years.

So what I mean by that is that AFL House, AFL directly would have conducted its own version of what they would call combines, but effectively just testing days where they would bring players.

15 to 20 promising young lads to Dublin and do a couple of physical and psychological tests with them and the best few would be put on display for Australian clubs to come and sign them.

The issue is that in the last couple of years that has lessened and clubs are now conducting their own version of scouting so they have their own there's a couple of clubs who would have existed outside of that infrastructure anyway but they they have their own scouts and they have their own way of accessing players and that means that there is a There's a Wild West element to this whereby, you know, you could have players being approached as young as 15, 16 and there's no necessarily protocols in place for that.

So what the GAA are trying to do, I think is, as you know Shane, this has always sat unwell with a certain section of people within the GAA and they're trying to build some sort of guardrails so that at least you're never going to stop this, like you will never ever stop the recruitment process, but could you put a bit more of a formal structure in place? I think you can.

to complete the task they've also called for that an implementation steering group and integration to be set up to complete the task is

January 2028 is that a more realistic target is that doable do you think If the will is there, it is.

He finished the day at the top of the leaderboard, despite all the conditions he would have thought would have affected somebody from a warmer clime.

He did, Joachim Nieman.

And I suppose the part that it can affect golfers in one of two ways is this is what happens when pace is so slow.

If you think about this for a second, Shane Lowry hit a putt on the sixth yesterday and then he teed off on the seventh.

He hit two shots in the space of an hour, in an hour.

That's what we're talking about, how slow this was yesterday.

So these were rounds that golfers here hadn't ever been exposed to before.

And of course, Larry, what is happening on the leaderboard? What's the latest?

Mm

...

the perfect criteria here.

So I'd say that might alleviate slightly the need to get this done in the, you know, in days here, let's say, right? Because y-you would have that presence there.

The more fundamental thing for me is the figure themselves and, um, I, I think it's what you need now.

Like you get a much clearer sense of it probably than even I do, but there is-- I, I think the, the, that nature of kind of maybe a bit of backlash like or a bit of kind of frustration is very evident to me in Galway football at the minute.

Like there, there's a lot, and you don't wanna let that fester either, you know what I mean? Like you do want the, again, I'm gonna use it because they won the All-Ireland and, uh, but like that, that Andy Moran kind of bounce, the positivity, the getting people back on side, supporters in behind the team, that is a big part of this too and an appointment is one way of, of delivering that, of getting people back on side and if that happens, then maybe you start to deal with the extra squad themselves and getting players back on board and making sure that nobody starts to have, you know, second thoughts or thinks to go off to Australia or Canada for a year or whatever it might be.

What do you feel is gonna be the biggest challenge for the manager that comes in? Is one of the biggest challenges I think anyways, is gonna be to get a consistent number one, that there's been too much chopping and changing in that position over the last two seasons.

Got a fitting end, didn't it?

It did.

It was, I think, back on March 2002 or even a couple of years ago, you think of what we saw with that Clare team, with Limerick 2018.

But that was the best Ireland final that I've certainly experienced.

One of the best sporting occasions I've ever experienced.

Just a genuine privilege to be there and the emotion that was seeping out of.

of Stephen there or Shane or the people that Brenda was talking to there I've experienced that for the past 16 odd hours from the hour before the game and that gorgeous tribute to the late Paul Clancy throughout the game looking around you in the stadium and to see what this game is able to do to people to knock around the team hotel this morning it's just this is what you want from sport.

Is there any chance of that young lad staying?

And even though it felt there were only five points behind Galway at halftime, you just felt limerick are there.

Yeah, they were surviving, but that's all that they were doing.

And all of the things you were hoping for in terms of, you know, there's some young players there, there was a huge expectation on them coming into this game, but they delivered.

Jason Rabbit was brilliant, but they weren't able to get more out of the pieces around them.

And that's a credit to Limerick and the way their tactical intelligence, the way they're able to share the load and play it the way that they do.

And everything about them, they're a very admirable bunch.

I was in...

And we didn't get that, in fairness.

what I remember, it's

probably Mayo's best game.

inside line? Yeah, I think in terms of not just the spread of threats that they have, also their ability to, you know, certain players who have quadrants, like they're very effective in one spot, but I don't know who can start inside and come out and do serious damage.

Coach McDonald can do it both.

I would have, I thought maybe something about that in Dara Byrne, players starting to come onto that left foot, it just happens naturally when you come onto the scene, they show you onto the right, but then the goal actually comes from a sky shot on his right that he just chases up after and manages to finish the goal on his right again, so There's a lovely versatility about them.

Their ability to make mistakes and keep going is very admirable in a way.

I didn't think that Kobe was perfect.

It's still sunny, but it's a different world now, isn't

Can we start with the good news and Wicklow's win with that amazing comeback in the second half?

It was absolutely sensational.

It's probably one of the, a feeling that I haven't had in Croke Park in a very long time when there was, I think Wicklow sold 10,000 tickets alone for this game, but they won over just about every single neutral in the second half as they started to make this incredible comeback.

And you got this sense live of how much it meant to them and how desperate they were for just something to cling on to.

And they had very little to cheer in the first half.

So if there was small moments, they would cheer that.

But it is also, it's a lovely illustration of where we're at in Gaelic football now in terms of these dramatic comebacks are actually possible, that the game is never quite done.

But it got away from them fairly sharpish, didn't it?

But what is it that's leading them down this path again?

Oh, look, it's gonna be a torturous winter.

I mean, Co- Cork are in for, um, a stern examination now.

Uh, I- The reality of elite sport is people will, will latch on to various elements, and is this psychological, is it tactical, is it physical? And it's probably a combination of all three.

But it is definitely noticeable that when a team comes out and plays open 15-on-15 hurling, Cork are as good as is out there.

They're, you know, they're able to go stride for stride with some phenomenal teams.

When they throw something different at them, and Gal- Galway's system is different.

Cl- should Clare have held out, do you think, or were they at the limits of what they could do against this Limerick team?

There's quite a lot of grumbling about refereeing decisions across the weekend.

There is, and I have to say, nothing is more tedious to my mind in GA discourse than referee talk.

It's just the same repetitive points.

Think about all the more interesting things that happened last weekend, and some people still think it's more interesting to talk about the referee, and you hear the same complaints after an under-12 game in West Gullery that you will after a qualifying in Croke Park.

Look, it's human nature.

You're always going to look at the margins are very fine in this game, and you're always going to look at a couple of calls that... might have gone your way should John Maher have gotten a penalty quite possibly from a Tyrone perspective I'm sure they will look back at the tackle on Peter Tague in the second half or some of those kind of key calls but from my perspective from a media perspective I think there are far more interesting things far more better things that are happening in the game and Every single team, when every single time you lose, the classic thing is to point to the referee.

I do think there might be other reasons why a team loses the game besides the officiating.

He's going to carry them all the way to back-to-back All-Irelands.

Um, do you fancy Galway against Dublin? I'd imagine they'd be narrow favorites, wouldn't they? But Dublin have played hot and cold this year as well.

Yeah, that was a, that was a real statement by this Dublin group yesterday, and kind of a reminder about the class that is in this squad.

When I say that, I mean the likes of, uh, uh, Ciarán Kilkenny and Niall Scully, who was playing like Brian O'Driscoll in Croke Park yesterday.

Um, Connor Callahan, despite the maybe the worry about him limping off injured in the end.

But they really reaffirmed that, g- gave everybody, issued a, a stark reminder about the talent that's in their group.

At the same time, I think if, um, this is a Galway team who've been to two All-Ireland finals and have ambitions to, to finally get over the hump, and in which case, you have to have full belief that you can go out and beat that Dublin team, who a- as we say, regardless of even if they do get seven days, they're coming off extra time-

Yeah.

Um, so the, for, for, for both of those teams, there's, what's, what's on offer here is, is fairly sensational.

The one that isn't a meeting of all Ireland finalists, which people can tell at a glance, and I'll try to be as neutral as I can here, Monaghan, Westmeath, above at home in Clonus again.

I mean, as a game, it's kind of...

I think the reason that I'm so excited by this draw is that every single team that's playing this weekend is travelling with genuine cause for belief, not hope.

So every single team believes they can win a game going into this weekend.

And it's epitomised by these two teams for me.

So you have Westmead, who had a very disappointing final day of the league and bounced back from that to become...

I mean, they're one of the stories of the summer to win the Ren's title the way that they did it.

his way, he wants that game in Parnell Park.

suggested that the d yeah he did

yeah he said it was actually asked of him that and he um he your listeners will have heard the question i hope but the that was how the question was framed and he said he felt like it definitely felt that way.

Lucky was, I think Donegal would take that badly enough today because it was, I think, you know, full disclosure, Cork deserved a win but it was definitely there for them and I think they really reflect on how it unravelled in that last quarter particularly and just some of the turnovers in their attack.

They had a couple of chances to, to really put the foot down even after the first goal here Paddy when Michael Murphy had the chance the palm chance that just came back out they had a chance to stretch this away but they didn't and look at the great thing about this game for me is that if you want if you're interested in football and you're I know most of your listeners are going to be Donegal inclined but You want a pathway to compete as an underdog.

We saw here today.

This was, to my mind, it was the best template I've seen at any level ever in the new rules for how an underdog competes, which is, it's not sexy.

It's not the most glamorous football.

Maybe you're losing some huge personnel there.