0:00

OTB Rugby. And if

0:02

everyone in Ireland's a wee bit worried, well you've got yourselves

0:04

to blame because it's your fault, because

0:06

it's what you did to them in July

0:09

last year that's pumped the beer properly,

0:11

you know. Subscribe

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to the rugby stream on the OTB Sports

0:14

app now. OTB AM. The

0:17

sports breakfast show from off

0:20

the ball.

0:33

Yeah, it is OTB AM, the sports breakfast show

0:36

on off the ball on this unseasonably sunny

0:38

early August morning. It's been beautiful to cycle

0:41

in this morning. The lads are laughing already. Quite

0:43

all Drom Conrad sort of duo. Colm Buigh,

0:45

how are you? Johnny Ward, what a pleasure.

0:47

Dan MacDonald of the Irish

0:50

Independent. How are you, Dan? Johnny, Colm,

0:52

how are you? We have lots to discuss

0:55

today. I'm going to start with you, Colm. What was your

0:57

highlight of the weekend? In

0:58

general? Yeah, like in life. Went

1:01

down to Cork. Always a highlight.

1:03

Always a highlight. Went to a pub, right, that I've never been to

1:05

before, which is actually a bit criminal. It's called

1:07

Sine. In Cork? Yeah.

1:10

As opposed to the one Geoff Buckley was famous

1:13

in or the one on the Quays? Yeah,

1:15

neither of those. Yeah, so this

1:17

one in Cork is trying to get out there. And

1:19

you see McCurtain Street in Cork has

1:21

come on leaps and bounds. Named after

1:23

the hunger striker. And that's on the, so

1:26

you go up Bridge Street, that's on the right hand side, and then Sine's

1:28

off to the left. And for

1:30

whatever reason over the years, now the people I was with were

1:33

absolutely certain that I had been there before, but I don't think I

1:35

had. Anyway, great spot. Sure there's plenty of

1:37

people out there who've been there. But I'd say that was

1:39

the highlight. Went down also to see my sister and

1:41

my niece came over from England. That was up there too. That

1:43

was a good highlight. And then on the sporting

1:45

front, probably

1:46

Cork, Cameron and Waterford because the in-laws of course

1:49

are from Waterford. Yeah,

1:51

you spoke with the in-laws last week and your

1:54

house movement, Dan. I'm sure you were interested because

1:56

you've had a long North Dublin sort of house

1:58

movement as well that's worked out well for yourself.

1:59

Well, I mean, yeah, I mean, I did move

2:02

there like four years ago. Talk a while. Four years

2:04

ago. But, uh, now columns move to the area. Yeah.

2:07

Dublin Nine is it? Dublin Nine, it's like, I

2:09

mean, it's, I don't know what more we can add here

2:12

to make this Anthony. What's it like being a blow-in on the

2:14

north side? Like,

2:15

scary. What is it?

2:17

Yeah. It's fish out of the water. Like, I

2:19

was eight years on the south side, bear in mind, you

2:21

know? You're also from Cork, like you were blowing, as

2:23

in, do you know what I mean? Totally, yeah. And then, you know, and

2:25

someone said to me there, it's actually our own Jess Carrick,

2:28

who

2:28

was like, you know, you're a dub now, like you live in Dublin, like

2:30

you bought a house. But I've never felt

2:32

less like a dub.

2:34

Mm. What is that? I suppose

2:38

I'm fighting against it, like. Yeah. I'm

2:40

fighting against the reality that I just bought a house in Dublin.

2:43

Well, I'm 23 years in Dublin. Oh,

2:46

yeah. I've gone on 24 and I was like 17 in East Galway.

2:52

But I'm, I'm a Galway-ian in my head. Yeah,

2:55

yeah. I think you'd be a bit proud of it. It's like

2:57

people who live in

2:58

Australia or Canada or America. If you're Irish,

3:00

you feel even more Irish.

3:01

You kind of feel even more Cork. But sure,

3:04

I'm only down there like two or three times a year. And the beauty

3:06

is as well, neither Colin nor I has

3:08

lost the accent that we had, as

3:11

opposed to Dan, who is basically a posh

3:13

dub and accent now. I don't know about that. But yeah,

3:15

no, I'm the same as you, like 24 years this year or next

3:18

year. And like you're more

3:20

than half your life. And then like if you have a,

3:23

you like, you know, you have a little one who is definitely

3:26

a dub, then you realize

3:28

it's changed. Nathan Morphy bringing kids

3:30

to Tallinn and all that. Tallinn, like, yeah, you see

3:32

all these, it's like, well, this is the point. I mean, this is

3:34

not coming back to the Dublin GAA point, but obviously you see

3:36

all these, like, you might know people who are

3:38

like inter-county players or whoever, you

3:41

know, who've naturally life has taken them to Dublin, that

3:43

all their kids are.

3:44

I remember, I remember being at

3:46

a wedding in England

3:49

and the father of

3:51

the bride was from basically

3:54

from Mount Beliou in Galway. And all the kids

3:57

had like real Manchester accents. And

3:59

I said, like, what's the difference?

5:59

a fella from Cork.

6:01

He then leased the land back to us. But I think there

6:03

was some sort of issue where this couldn't happen. So he

6:06

planted the land, which is quite sad, but it's turned

6:08

into like a real wooded area now. So it's really like

6:10

full of wildlife. So it's full

6:12

of like deer, red squirrel, pine marten,

6:15

foxes, anything you want, loads

6:17

of birds. So it's like going

6:19

home now is like therapy, like getting away from the city.

6:21

And I actually do love East Galway,

6:24

whether I could live there. I don't think he

6:26

could no chance. I

6:27

think I could really think I could, because

6:30

if you have Wi-Fi, it's honestly like, so

6:32

if you had Instagram, you could live there because you could

6:34

chronicle the color of your life. But

6:36

otherwise, if all you had was to live there,

6:38

but you couldn't tell anyone about it,

6:41

could you do it? You

6:44

know that Christ, though, when the Wi-Fi goes down, all right,

6:46

like there's no access to 4G. That's the crisis

6:49

of our time. Yeah. You know what I mean? It's like, oh,

6:51

Jesus, never more alone. You're never more alone

6:53

when you have no coverage. Yeah. And like, I

6:55

got the train. I get the train a lot. Or

6:58

even if you're in an airport and like,

7:01

God, if somebody hadn't access to his or

7:03

her phone, the world has ended like, because like,

7:05

God, you might have to talk to someone. Come here now. Just

7:07

before we get to the coming up there, Kevin Callahan's

7:09

on my fashion buzz. Nice tap, Johnny.

7:12

YouTube comments. I

7:15

actually, there's a story, which isn't, it's not

7:17

really amusing, but there was the Instagram targets of

7:19

ads I find are exceptionally good. And

7:22

there was this like, it was a t-shirt

7:24

that was based on an old kind of VHS

7:26

kind of

7:28

team. And I was like, that's a really

7:31

cool t-shirt. So I went to buy

7:33

it, but then it was like free postage

7:36

if you spend so much. So I had to add on

7:38

a couple of things. And this was one of them. That was

7:40

that's basically what he came into being like consumer.

7:42

You know, the way like, remember when Big Jack went

7:45

to was it like he got he wants to get

7:47

out and then he got Aldo as well or voice for an Oxford.

7:49

Yeah. So it's kind of like that. Like the other was like,

7:51

gosh, you might as well get him as well. Like he's got an Irish

7:53

baby over there. And I had like the shorts.

7:56

I wore them all up beyond the pale award. The

7:58

whole, the whole.

7:59

get up and mixed reaction.

8:02

That's what he said. Mainly from the

8:04

Mrs. like this disgraceful outfit. She

8:07

had a mixed reaction.

8:08

Yeah, like she didn't throw up like but in her head she kind

8:10

of did. Coming up on the show today. What

8:12

does that say? Talk to the

8:15

audience. So performance rankings were already

8:17

gone over the time there. We're going to

8:20

talk about Man United in Dublin anyway. Let's

8:22

definitely mention that. Alan Quinlan is going

8:24

to talk about the Art of Italy game at the same venue. Yeah,

8:28

lots to ruminate about there. How did the

8:30

French players get on? Sarah Dunna was going

8:32

to be on then more or less in the middle of

8:34

the show to talk about a

8:36

one-sided Kamogi final.

8:39

All be it one that I think introduced the

8:41

concepts, some people of how good the sport

8:43

could be. Certainly to me anyway, Andy Mitten was actually

8:45

at the Aviva Stadium. So we're going to hear from him. Tim

8:48

Clancy is in studio. Tim Clancy is one

8:50

of these out of work managers who was

8:52

pining to get back or not but was going to

8:54

talk about Derry City in Europe and the League

8:56

of Ireland. He only left squad a couple of months

8:58

ago. And then we'll hear at the end of the show

9:00

from Gordon Darcy and James

9:02

Downey who were on yesterday. I

9:05

guess it is time

9:06

for the performance rankings. You

9:09

know that wasn't an all-around winning performance. Probably should

9:11

have won the game based on the second half performance. Is

9:13

it a step to our say is the performance so

9:15

far of the World Cup? Namely not. OTBAS

9:18

performance rankings. I'm just talking about performances

9:21

with just like that intensity.

9:24

Yeah so if you're doing

9:27

the performance rankings, Colin would say okay,

9:29

this is what it will likely entail. Dan

9:32

is notoriously hostile

9:34

to other sports so he's in the hot seat today. That's not remotely

9:36

true to be clear. It's not remotely true. Dan,

9:39

where are we starting now? No, well I'm going to start with football.

9:41

Speaking of hostility. How

9:43

many football starts are there now? Okay, no I mean I

9:45

really enjoy golf and horse racing and

9:47

other sports as you know. At Viva

9:50

Stadium friendlies, yeah well look I was writing

9:52

about this last week. I mean and this was

9:54

a

9:54

reference to Manchester

9:57

United in Dublin at the weekend. We see

9:59

some like noise.

9:59

pictures there of players. And

10:02

look, it's a personal taste. This isn't one of these things

10:04

of telling people how to live

10:06

their lives. Like people can choose to

10:08

spend their money as they want and it's not

10:10

one of these up on the

10:13

sort of, you know, given

10:15

a sermon about what people should do. It's not one of

10:17

those. I actually think like it's

10:19

actually for some of those people, it

10:21

must have been a very deeply frustrating experience

10:24

on Saturday lunchtime when you see

10:26

the team news coming through from Old Trafford and

10:30

Manchester and I are playing a full strength team

10:32

or close to a full strength team and they're

10:34

getting there. And you know then that the team

10:36

that's coming to Dublin is

10:40

not going to be the strongest one. And what

10:42

were the tickets for the video today? Well, I think it was

10:44

upwards of sort of, I mean, 75 euro.

10:46

You hear people talking about 110. That was premium.

10:49

So there's obviously different tiered

10:51

prices and, you know, kids tickets to be different prices.

10:53

Now these sold out within 10 minutes this game. I

10:56

mean, like this is obviously the deep love

10:58

and sort of passion that there is for

10:59

Manchester in Dublin, that they can sell

11:02

it out. I mean, there's all sorts of football games

11:04

in the Aviva that would be delighted at 40,000 people

11:07

would go. And like this is the first time

11:09

here since 2017 and I understand it and

11:12

a lot of people

11:14

would have bought those tickets on the basis of it

11:16

being, you know, you can imagine that the

11:18

conversations people would have, you know, are like

11:21

parents with their kids and it's not just parents with their kids. It's

11:23

just it's the one sometimes you go to. Kids with their parents. Yeah,

11:25

but it's an element of well, you know, will I

11:27

see Bruno or will I see Rashford

11:29

or will I see whoever? And look,

11:32

I mean, there's no suggestion that like Eric,

11:34

you know, to the Haggart and should be, it's not a case of

11:36

saying, oh, well, that's a disgrace. I mean, they're

11:38

just doing their job. The issue is the terms

11:40

and conditions for the whole occasion.

11:43

But the FBI are arranged in these games. They're

11:46

completely free hit for them in the sense they got a flat

11:48

fee for hosting it. The organizers bring

11:51

together the teams and

11:53

clearly in some cases for these friendlies.

11:56

I remember in the past Barcelona coming here.

11:58

There was a bit of discussion about, you know, trying to get to get

12:00

people will try and get terms and conditions in these friendlies

12:02

that Messi has to play or you know X

12:04

amount of players have to play. Clearly there's

12:06

no such terms and conditions here and

12:09

like I know from the perspective of even and

12:11

no one cares about the press the press perspective

12:14

but you see the email coming out you know apply

12:16

for accreditation for this game just

12:18

note there will be no post match press conference afterwards

12:21

and you're just looking at this going these are just

12:23

getting in and they're getting out and there's

12:26

no terms conditions at all there's no obligation

12:28

and there's a sense of the power

12:31

of the name will mean that it will sell and

12:33

that's it and it turned out

12:35

that the tickets for the game on Old Trafford and Saturday were

12:37

certainly 20% cheaper

12:40

I think or certainly considerably cheaper I

12:42

actually spoke to David Snead the

12:44

weekend who's obviously you know with strong Manchester

12:46

night connections he spoke about a friend of his from from

12:49

Ireland who actually flew over to the game in Manchester

12:51

and all things considered it would have been cheaper

12:54

to do that trip than it would be for

12:56

a lot of people particularly coming from outside

12:58

Dublin to come to this game as you know it's not

13:01

gonna enter a cost of living stuff and you get there

13:03

and look at you can't maybe there's loads of people out there

13:05

who went who will say no we enjoyed our day

13:07

it was a good time and we were around

13:09

fellow fans and you know got some nice

13:12

photographs and and you know there was that's

13:15

fine but like these occasions never

13:17

live up to it every time I see a

13:19

preseason friendly arranged in Dublin I'm thinking

13:22

well I need to figure out how not to go to

13:24

that because that's not going to be

13:27

it's not going to live up to the billing but naturally

13:30

every time it's not sold to people in

13:32

that way was the end they empty their pockets

13:34

on half truth you know and there's

13:36

a lot of a lot of what happiness out

13:38

there and what technically no lies were told you

13:41

know again they have no obligation but clearly

13:44

like it's been booked on the basis of just bring a team

13:47

it'll sell anyway

13:48

and it did well I think it's very unsatisfied

13:50

was it the Amstel tournament all those years ago in

13:52

Derry City were playing and they're like

13:55

Newcastle United came over and

13:57

they had they ran a little run for a couple years

13:59

and I organised a bus from Galway to Coop because

14:02

I was getting into the League of Ireland at the time and I wanted

14:04

to go up and see Derry City but everyone

14:06

else can obviously Newcastle or Celtic

14:08

or all these teams and that

14:10

was nowhere near sold out at the time but this

14:13

I got like loads of demands for people who wanted

14:15

tickets last week. As did Dan actually

14:17

and I was like I didn't realise I wasn't

14:19

even aware of the friendly itself but then I was

14:21

like there are still a massive Man United

14:23

support in Ireland that want to see them and

14:26

like back in the day I would have been I would

14:28

mean like a follow your league of

14:29

Ireland team but like it's each their own if you want to go up and

14:32

see them I actually did feel a bit sorry for like a kid

14:34

who wants to see Man United and like he's built

14:36

up to the day and then you just see everyone booing Harry

14:38

Maguire. Yeah it's huge like I got back into Houston

14:41

at about six o'clock Sunday evening

14:44

and when I was walking out it was just a sea

14:46

of Manchester United jerseys going back to

14:49

counties not from Dublin basically all families

14:51

ranging from all age groups all almost

14:53

all of them too had the New Jersey which I thought was striking

14:56

it was like wow the money that this club accumulates

14:59

and so it is it's

15:01

a debate right there in the middle because United don't

15:03

owe anyone anything you could argue right so they

15:05

played London Old Trafford on Saturday and you look at

15:07

the starting 11 there and it was ominous for the following

15:10

day because it's a really strong team like yeah

15:12

like that start that starting team that

15:14

played against London a 3-1 win could very

15:16

feasibly be a team that United

15:18

were put against Man City in the Manchester Derby

15:21

so that was that looked bad like straight away

15:23

and then

15:24

they go the next day and they get this massive

15:26

money-making operation because they're commercial

15:29

classes United they've been doing this for 20

15:31

plus years they're all way ahead of like if you look at the 90s look

15:34

at Anfield was basically dilapidated

15:37

in comparison to Old Trafford and the work that they

15:39

did like there's that famous game in

15:42

was it October 95 was Cantonist

15:44

first game back in Fountains-Foure twice and

15:46

the stands there reconstructed yeah that's

15:48

right and so it looked terrible at the time but it was all like

15:50

i'd think about the long term the glazers come in they

15:53

really maximise their commercial yeah but even before

15:55

that like in the previous regime it was like this

15:57

the stadium was incredible and now United are

15:59

actually following behind in terms of the stadium,

16:01

but the commercial enterprise just grew and grew and grew.

16:03

Remember after the Treble Day release, Beyond the

16:06

Promised Land, I think was the video which was like, it

16:08

went huge, like people bought it everywhere. So

16:10

you fast forward to the modern day, and like

16:12

you said, Johnny, like each to their own, and

16:14

you know, you should have an absolutely massive support. And

16:17

you say, you get the average kid saying to their parents, I

16:19

really want to go, bring me to this match. And

16:21

there was still one or two stars that played. So the picture

16:23

that we showed on screen was Jaylen Sancho

16:26

getting a selfie, you know, one of the more

16:28

expensive players the last few years. So that's another star.

16:31

And there's so many stars in the team, as in

16:33

stars that kids were like, that it was probably justified

16:36

to a lot of kids leaving the AVV yesterday thinking,

16:38

thank you so much for bringing me. But then the rest of us are looking

16:40

at from a footballing perspective, it was like, what

16:42

was that all about? They had a basically a

16:45

festival of football over the weekend where their headline

16:47

act was on Saturday. Yeah, USA

16:49

at the World Cup, Dan is next.

16:52

Yeah, well, they're out. They, I...

16:55

There's never gone wrong with them. No, I

16:57

mean, it was striking. I was looking before that game against

16:59

Sweden on the weekend.

17:02

And even just like the, even some of the

17:04

betting markets and stuff, it was clear it was going to be a low

17:07

scoring game. There was an anticipation

17:09

that this was going to be a bit of a slog. And

17:11

part of that is maybe on account of Sweden's

17:14

reputation as much as anything.

17:17

But yeah, I mean, like the, there's

17:20

this sort of litany of shocks in the World Cup.

17:22

I mean, England probably, you know, were

17:24

sort of one penalty kick away from being in here

17:26

too, because they, they really left

17:28

it

17:29

late against Nigeria in the sense of, I mean, not

17:31

left it late, I mean, they won on penalties. But I mean, they were

17:33

hanging on an extra time with 10 players

17:36

on the pitch and they could have been gone too. And

17:38

the whole competition seems to be opening up to

17:41

the point where like, I think, you know, Spain are the second

17:43

favorites, having like basically left 12

17:45

players at home due to a

17:47

dispute coming up to the competition. So it's

17:49

all falling apart. And USA are sort

17:52

of like, you know, the traditional power that you

17:54

think, okay, they're going to take control of the situation.

17:56

And they're just gone. They're already at the exit

17:59

round the

17:59

16th.

17:59

on penalties, a lot of people may have seen the

18:02

penalty kick incident where the ball sort of

18:04

did across the line, the power technology. If

18:07

you haven't, can you explain it? Well, it was

18:09

the last penalty kick for the Swedish player and... Look

18:12

at that. You don't see that in the ball. Yeah,

18:14

there's the... You cannot be serious. The goalkeeper

18:17

sort of pushed it up and it's actually, you need to watch

18:19

it a couple of times to get a sense of what happened. And

18:22

the player didn't even seem particularly sure that

18:24

they'd scored this momentous,

18:27

like this is your David O'Leary moment here or

18:29

something,

18:29

not quite maybe on that scale. Sweden are a top

18:32

team, but it's still a momentous

18:34

thing to knock America out of the World Cup and

18:36

you have this agonising delay while you

18:38

wait for it to happen. And then it happens. What's

18:41

the most underwhelming celebration

18:43

of a momentous achievement in the history

18:46

of anything? Because you have to wait so long. In

18:49

live play as well, it really looked like the keeper saved it. Like

18:52

I really did, so I understand the delay by everyone.

18:55

You mentioned David O'Leary. Steve

18:57

McGinnis had his 50th birthday celebration

18:59

the other night to XPFAI head. Charlie

19:02

O'Leary was at it. Why not? Current PFAI

19:04

head. Well, currently, let's not retire him. What, Charlie

19:06

O'Leary? Charlie O'Leary was there. He was, yeah. Charlie

19:09

now? God, he's pushing close to 100 territory.

19:11

He lives in Dublin 9 as well, or that neck of a

19:13

boss. Who doesn't? He's one of our neighbours, I

19:15

think.

19:16

Yeah, Charlie doesn't disown it, though. Or he's maybe

19:18

Dublin 5, but he's nearby. But

19:20

yeah, like he was there, yeah.

19:23

I mean, it's a slight tangent, but he is an incredibly

19:26

powerful football figure. And

19:29

he's still going strong, unlike the American

19:31

women of the world. Nice. I see

19:33

how he's thinking. How am I going to bring this back? He's got his

19:35

love for tangents. Yeah. But of

19:38

course, the American then, like, you know, Megan Raffanoe

19:40

missed the penalty and like Donald

19:42

Trump's having a go. Their

19:45

defeat is like

19:46

a defeat for wokeness, you know, that they've gone out. So

19:51

like just all this... What were we up for, Dan? Who are the

19:53

neutrals in Ireland up for now?

19:55

Well...

19:56

England? I don't know. I'd

19:58

imagine this. We have this, you know...

19:59

We should be mature as a nation. Don't worry if you're watching

20:02

Man United on YouTube. We should be mature as a nation, blah blah

20:04

blah, but they're not up-ringed. Yeah, okay. You

20:06

know, they're not up-ringed. The, um... Japan

20:08

are sort of, um... Japan are up there. That's a

20:10

story you could probably get behind, you know? It's

20:13

like Jamaica and Colombia, um,

20:15

you have the sort of, uh, you know, the Colombian

20:18

assassins.

20:19

Or are they, you

20:21

know, who England played the winner of that game, so... Assassins?

20:24

Did you not follow the hold? Beforehand, remember Denise

20:26

O'Sullivan? Finally, that was called by... Oh, sorry, yes, yes,

20:28

yes. We might, uh, have a grudging respect for them,

20:31

like, yes, the documentaries, like, over time we might

20:33

have, uh... You may realize they weren't that bad at all.

20:35

No, no, they weren't that bad. But four penalties missed

20:37

in a row in this shoehead or two, which is quite phenomenal,

20:39

before the winning kick, which was quite ambiguous. Um,

20:42

America, America, of course, won the last two World

20:44

Cup, so this is kind of... Just hasn't gotten going. What is

20:46

the equipment of, like, France, uh, the traditional, too, World Cup? I

20:49

know they've gone around for harder America, but they were very unconvincing,

20:51

and they're nearly without the group. Yeah, you were thinking, okay, they're

20:53

gonna get gone, and they haven't.

20:54

Arsenal are also here. When

20:57

you save on auto insurance for driving safe with

20:59

USAA's Safe Pilot, you'll feel

21:01

like a big deal. Even

21:04

in a traffic jam. Save

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up to 30% with USAA's Safe Pilot. Restrictions

21:10

apply.

21:11

Now, this is the honour. We're going into Amber,

21:14

and we're going to... So we're going into Irish rugby

21:16

and Arsenal. Let's talk Dan, let's talk rugby. Well,

21:18

let's talk rugby. Yeah. Dan loves

21:20

rugby. Oh, yeah. Well, the one

21:23

thing I do have in aversion to is

21:25

placing too much importance in, like, warm-up games,

21:28

and, like, I've read from Arsenal in here, too, because,

21:30

like, what does the Community Shield win mean?

21:32

It basically means nothing. Now, unfortunately,

21:34

like, you know, sports shows have to talk about them

21:37

and find the meaning from them, and there will be new signings

21:39

or new players or whatever it might be.

21:41

But, I mean, Arsenal won the Community Shield in 2020. Our

21:44

title was nearly gone two months later, around

21:46

the time they were playing on the block. I remember at the time, it was like, the

21:49

feel-good factor around Arsenal continues, as they

21:51

win the Community Shield. It counted for nothing. Yeah.

21:54

Leicester won it a year later. I mean, I'll have to mention

21:56

it beforehand, if anyone remembers. And in fairness, the

21:58

other staff in the show remember. who won the Community Shield,

22:01

I couldn't. I looked up and I was like, this is no bearing

22:03

on anything. So yeah, I mean,

22:05

Aristola chose that they're in good health, but I don't

22:07

think Man City are

22:09

suddenly trembling because this new force

22:12

like, you know, hit back against them in

22:14

the Community Shield with a lot of extra time

22:17

in it. And the Irish Rugby game again,

22:19

look, I mean, it's just, to me, these,

22:21

I know people, this is like the odd, you

22:24

know, chess matches and friendlies, but like it's, it's

22:26

a war, the Rugby World Cup friendlies

22:28

are very much

22:30

warm up matches, more so than any other. It seems to

22:32

be avoiding injury as much as anything. And

22:34

can you glean too much from them? So

22:37

I wouldn't be putting anyone in green on the basis of their

22:39

performance. I mean, it's green for

22:41

the result. Like 33.17 against

22:43

society. We only played a few months ago, so wasn't

22:45

that inspiring to play Italy again? Like it's the first match

22:47

that I've played since the 18th match, but it's all crucial.

22:49

It's all necessary to get some sort of, have to play, get

22:51

them going. But like we were saying before, I looked at

22:54

they're only playing three warm up games for fish.

22:56

They never against Portugal this week in warm

22:58

weather training, but that'll be behind closed doors, extremely

23:00

unofficial

23:00

Columbia style. But yeah, there's

23:02

only three warm ups, which is the first time since 2007, every subsequent

23:06

World Cup since then it's been four games. But

23:08

Andy Farrell had that put to him and he said,

23:11

look, we don't need the games. Like this is all about training and

23:13

this squad know each other so, so well now. So like,

23:15

look,

23:16

you, one could probably hazard

23:18

a guess at the 23 that will be in the first game,

23:21

like from the starters and the bench,

23:23

but it's probably more the periphery, peripheral

23:25

figures. And then also at the weekend,

23:27

it just showcased that Kaitlyn Doris can really play across

23:29

the back row. Like he was absolutely phenomenal at seven scoring

23:32

two tries. He did a burst in the

23:34

second half. But

23:36

you have the Jack Conan thing, you have the Italian guy,

23:39

I was like, how can you play these warm ups in

23:41

rugby without having this massive, massive,

23:43

massive risk of injury? So it's a really,

23:45

really tough one for Farrell because it's

23:47

like Doris played like how

23:49

much did he play the game? Like he was, and you're

23:51

like, why are we risking these lads? You

23:54

see, if you want, if you go out there with that mentality,

23:56

you will get injured. Yeah, I know what you mean. And you have

23:58

to have to play the warm

23:59

It's like any sport preparing for

24:02

any major competition. It's funny yesterday Like

24:04

Sam Ewing just back from injury breaks his leg basically

24:06

a cork and I say it to Danny

24:09

Gilligan Who's like basically in the same stable is

24:11

like, you know

24:12

You're you're the same age more less as him as a little

24:15

bit younger and you know You must

24:17

be in your head like that. This can happen goes off not my head

24:19

Like you can't think like that. I never think like that. But

24:21

em, yeah, I saw the interview Wesley Joyce

24:23

the jockey Oh, yeah, like any

24:26

tangent but like a jockey was in a very serious

24:28

injury at the Galbi races last year and Sort

24:31

of a powerful entry that effectively like

24:33

he's sort of lost the full use of his

24:35

yeah So he speaks like he's kind of whispering kind of yeah,

24:38

it's amazing that he can even that's but he's back So

24:41

you know you can't from my Ross like

24:42

did his story's a movie like and

24:45

and he's the story isn't written yet and But

24:48

just come back to our son of Declan Rice. So I

24:51

How was he?

24:53

He was he was good. He was good for what I saw

24:55

another reaction to us. Yeah Yeah, I

24:58

know Roy Keane thought about him not being worth it and but I

25:00

mean the problem with that is that no one was worth the

25:02

money You

25:04

know this 105 million

25:07

if he stays an arse stuff for a decade then it's value for

25:09

money because then yeah Like um,

25:12

and it's so uninteresting the fee discussion,

25:14

isn't it because I think we're way beyond that I

25:18

think people debate transfer fees. They

25:20

recall what transfer fees were when like

25:22

Andy Cole went for seven Sports

25:27

news the other day and in the space of like a minute

25:29

There was like there was the news and brief transfers

25:32

and it was like a 22 million a 32 million in a 26

25:34

million Like it

25:36

did look 105 million is 20 million in sort of

25:39

how we in inflation We sort of way

25:41

when Roy Keane moved together for 3.75 million

25:44

people talk about bankers money She writes Newcastle 15

25:46

million was a well record crazy money like what's going wrong

25:48

with the game It doesn't matter the figures change

25:50

but the like the sentiment stays the same like

25:53

people will always be

25:53

outraged by big fees I actually kind

25:55

of have sympathy for a key now at the moment because

25:58

it's like are you

26:00

Are you Roy Keane or are you what people expect

26:02

of Roy Keane because he says something about Declan Rice

26:04

and I was like, all

26:06

my feed of media stuff for the weekend

26:09

was like, Roy Keane says something about Declan

26:11

Rice. I'm like, how is this even a story? Like it was everywhere.

26:14

Well it's his poll because he's the biggest poll. That

26:17

poll factors into his contract negotiation. Yeah.

26:20

Well there's going to be an announcement today. He's on United's

26:22

social media accounts that there's this teaser

26:24

of him or he appears from the shadows and this is the

26:26

8th of August, 2023. So that's today, something's

26:29

coming. He's not announcing another

26:30

game of Dublin, is he? He's

26:33

saying. So they've made amends but like, oh, it

26:35

could be a commercial outlet. Look, also Dan,

26:37

Fergus Kuehl in the comments there has a bone to pick

26:39

which is about your amber choices. Arsenal won their game,

26:42

why Orange? And Ireland B won their

26:44

game comfortably, why Orange? Otter nonsense. Now,

26:47

you had a point to prove about because we were saying

26:49

maybe Arsenal and Green but you were like, nah, nah, nah. Well

26:51

I mean, let's take it as the performance rankings

26:53

are based on a traffic light, right? And it's in the context

26:56

of where they're going and the context of their goal

26:58

this season. Are you saying that they've sped on

27:00

through now?

27:01

Like they're on you go, you

27:03

are ready, like you are off to go. Well,

27:06

when it's too late to brake

27:09

and the lights are at amber, you go through and

27:11

that's Arsenal. They won the community shield.

27:13

They beat the shuttle winners. You need a light green

27:15

or something here, you know, or whatever. But if it's too late to brake,

27:17

it's actually dangerous stuff. But I'm advocating that

27:19

people do that. A lot of them are saying this, Fergus, no, I

27:22

don't think green for me are like competitive

27:24

wins, not. I know, but it's not their fault that

27:26

it's not a competitive game. Oh yeah, but like, I know. I

27:28

mean, now it's I don't know if they hit

27:30

green this week and

27:31

what the where do they go if they win their five league.

27:34

The performance ranking is the day of itself. Like

27:36

it's not an overall green. We've got

27:38

greens. They're cooking. If

27:40

you're waking up groggy at three minutes to eight after

27:42

bank holiday weekend and you're listening to two lads on about

27:45

like whether it should be green or amber. So that's the whole

27:47

slash. Go ahead.

27:53

So one thing is that at the injury time at the end

27:56

of the paths, women, the broiler will discuss that

27:58

later on. Yeah, but it will. Let's let's mention the

27:59

And then just very briefly, our sneak lies in the 11th minute

28:02

of 13 added on. If they continue that,

28:04

like you said beforehand, the player's going to go mad. We'll

28:06

talk about it with you. Yeah, we will. Although,

28:08

I mean, it shows that maybe over the years football matches have only ever really

28:11

been 70 minutes long. No, I know

28:13

that, but then like, bring it down to 80 minutes. Don't be,

28:15

it's too long. Like, psychologically, it's crazy. Yeah,

28:17

Cyclotically, it's crazy. Not that Simpson's reference, really, really touching

28:20

one when the mental people sort of took over Springfield

28:22

and they got rid of the green light. So it went from

28:24

red to amber. So like, traffic went

28:26

like, oh! So like, all traffic went faster. And

28:29

Lenny's at the,

28:29

he goes, and it goes, and he goes, oh! He goes

28:32

through and he goes, oh, thank God I made that light. And then

28:34

he goes, if only I had somewhere to go. That's

28:37

one of these touching moments. Yeah. Speaking

28:39

of touching moments, we have two more to go down.

28:41

Yeah, we do. We have the green. Well,

28:43

again, like, you know, meaningful wins. So

28:46

Cork, well, I mean, as Colin mentioned,

28:49

like, it was a little bit of a massacre on Sunday. And

28:52

it's one of those games where you, like, you flick over a

28:54

little bit late, you know, and they're like,

28:56

sort of, 20, 25 minutes. And even then, it's like, OK, this

28:58

looks ominous. But-

28:59

Lordford missed goal chances in touching the first half.

29:02

That was the killer. Yeah. But

29:04

like, you have Amy on kind of talking about scoring a hat trick and

29:06

not realizing she's done it. Yeah. What

29:08

an absolute champ. Like, that is humility. How

29:11

is she from Cork? Seriously. It's

29:13

genuine. But like, is she from Cork? The

29:15

game could have been different, right? Because it was one

29:17

9-3 points at a half time. But Lordford had a

29:19

penalty last point for the first half. And another goal change,

29:21

as well. Yeah, wide top left, and she doesn't miss

29:23

these things. So that was a turning point. But yeah, a hat trick

29:25

in two minutes. Unbelievable. Yeah,

29:28

you don't want to- The broken memories

29:29

of Robbie Fowler, it's 4 minutes 35 against Arsenal back in

29:32

the day. Yeah, no. I mean,

29:34

he definitely- I don't think he was in the zone

29:36

where he didn't know he'd done it. You

29:39

know what I mean? Like, and it's just, yeah, like, sort

29:41

of when you- the last couple of minutes and it's

29:43

sort of meandering away and it's sort of like junk time

29:45

and it's sort of a basketball game where it's just game

29:47

over. And like, that's not what you want. But

29:50

I know, like, we've got Sarah Donovan coming up anyway to

29:52

sort of pick over the sort of details of

29:54

the game. But to me, it's- I don't know, it's

29:56

a karquing, but I think it's the individual

29:59

brilliance.

29:59

of a sort of a multi-talented

30:03

sort of sports person as well as we spoke about

30:05

last week. We're going to hear from Amy around

30:07

the time we heard from Sirdhan. Very

30:09

very brief though, I'm watching the Sunday game highlights

30:12

last night.

30:13

Kamogi could be really marketable. I'm

30:16

telling you because like it's gotten a lot more physical

30:18

as well and it's fast. It's

30:21

clearly improving skillfully wise and if

30:23

you brought like, fair enough, Harlan,

30:25

Kamogi, whatever, but if you brought like a tourist to

30:28

a good Kamogi game at Crow Park with the atmosphere

30:30

on Sunday, that's a lot closer. People

30:32

are like,

30:33

this is something. Like it's really, I don't

30:35

know. I was actually

30:39

texting Ole Connor last night because he was on the show last

30:41

week and I was like, this is

30:44

because it's funny from East

30:46

College, from where I'm from, it's like all ladies football.

30:48

Kamogi doesn't really feature. But you're watching it,

30:50

so you're watching every now and then you're like, Jesus, if

30:52

you could sell this game a bit more,

30:54

I don't know. It's the same as Harlan I

30:56

suppose. Yeah, it's just so

30:58

condensed as well. But I don't think we've

31:01

heard of it. When we've been talking about Kamogi in the performance

31:03

rankings this year, it's been about protests and it's not really been

31:05

about the game itself. Off the top of my head at home,

31:07

we don't have a Kamogi team. We've a very good

31:09

Harlan team. We've a very good ladies football team. We don't

31:11

have a Kamogi team. Off the top of my head. Women's getting

31:13

football is ahead of Kamogi in terms of marketing

31:16

for sure. On your right, like there's a serious game there that's

31:18

been left behind, but it seems like there's only so much

31:20

room for certain people or for some people to actually get in bar

31:22

with this. There was over 30,000 at Crow Park watching

31:24

this game. The car victory is not good in

31:27

some respects. The margin of victory when

31:29

people look, the worry is people looking at me like, Ashu, look.

31:32

But Waterford appearing in the first final since 1945, never won

31:34

it before. And then you watch the majesty of that

31:36

hat trick. And even the penalty missed

31:38

in the last pocket, the first half, right? There was drama in

31:40

the game. But if you're looking at the result, you're thinking Ashu,

31:42

Jesus, what's the point of that? But the game itself,

31:45

like you said, was actually entertaining and spelled. Alan Quinlan

31:47

is waiting patiently. So we have finally,

31:49

Dan, our new favourite Irish team basically. Well, yeah,

31:51

there's always these phases of a team

31:54

being involved,

31:54

like Preston and Stoke

31:57

and Burnley and Burnley have a good contingent. But I think Southampton

31:59

is going to be a good team.

31:59

to be won this year. So they were playing Friday

32:02

night against Sheffield Wednesday and Gavin

32:04

Bazouno, Will Smallbone and Ryan

32:06

Manning all started. So Bazouno, not

32:08

a great surprise to me, he's like retained his place or he's

32:10

regained his place under a new manager,

32:13

Russell Martin. Smallbone, there was talk of

32:15

him going out again, maybe leaving Southampton,

32:17

but he was in there, played the full 90 minutes and

32:20

Ryan Manning, who's basically, he's moved from Swansea,

32:22

he's with Russell Martin again. Now, again,

32:25

like, Sheffield Wednesday have come

32:28

up, you know, and, and

32:30

Southampton are coming down and there's still like Premier

32:32

League quality there, like Ward Prowse, will he go,

32:34

will he stay, we'll see. But the last couple

32:36

of minutes, they were very comfortable. Smallbone was involved,

32:39

keeping the ball, like just really,

32:41

really involved, sort of metronomic and how sort

32:43

of his presence in the match. Manning

32:45

looks like he's going to play all the time. And Bazouno

32:48

might be a good thing for him just to have the experience

32:50

of winning games sort of week on week.

32:53

And yeah, I think financially,

32:55

they may still have to lose a couple of players. And I'm not sure

32:57

if they're going to be up there all season, but I think there's a very

32:59

strong chance they will be. I think like for three

33:02

players who, you know, okay, Manning,

33:04

him and Stephen Kenny, it just hasn't been an easy

33:07

union. But you'd imagine there's a fair old

33:09

chance of him being involved in the autumn. And

33:12

yeah, I think for Bazouno and Smallbone, it's

33:14

just great to see them involved. In a team, it

33:16

will be. They pass the ball

33:19

a lot. They pass the ball. They, like the last couple

33:21

of minutes, it was like keep ball stuff and

33:23

Smallbone was just everywhere. You know, just taken

33:25

very simple sort of five yard passes. I think

33:27

they're playing forward at the back of this though, because Russell Martin was a real treat

33:29

at the back of last. Yeah, I think they probably have the versatility.

33:32

Manning is quite versatile as well. But, you know.

33:35

It's funny though, Dan, watching him when he was a number 10 at going out, the

33:37

idea of him playing left back, left center back is

33:39

bonkers. Like he was a complete number 10. But

33:42

in fairness to him, where is the left back to be in Ireland

33:44

now? Because obviously, like, McCain is kind of edging away

33:46

from it. Well, yeah, he's gone to Rexton. And you'd imagine

33:49

probably being in league two. I mean, he's got to 100 caps

33:51

now, which was a big landmark. So we'll see

33:54

where he stands. And the Stevens has got his back

33:56

to Stoke now and his back player as well. So

33:58

he sort of

33:59

forget him, he was involved at the weekend, then

34:02

Kalim O'Dowda got to short and was terrible

34:04

in Greece, like really terrible. And

34:07

you know, so it probably is up for grabs for

34:09

someone to take ownership of the situation

34:11

and maybe, you know, Manning

34:14

at Southampton could be the thing that, you

34:16

know, properly sort of propels him forward.

34:18

But I think it's, I think it's wide open. We should

34:21

mention Adam Ida as well scored the winning goal for Nargent.

34:23

What a place to put the delight on the Cork man's face.

34:25

Like he needed, like he didn't start,

34:27

but then he, you know, he got a goal and he needed

34:29

that. And Shane Duffy back playing as well. Absolutely half.

34:32

Absolutely half. Aaron Connelly. Yes.

34:35

How did you make of that? Because he sort of said, I love the kid afterwards. I

34:37

think he does though. Aaron Connelly, divisive

34:39

figure, but I think Duffy and Connelly have seen

34:42

a bit of social media stuff before to suggest that

34:44

they, you know, there's a sort of a big

34:46

brother thing of Brighton going on. But

34:49

yeah, no, like the weekend that was,

34:51

I suppose, the EFL being back

34:54

and there was at least some, some positive

34:56

Irish involvement. What is the general

34:59

sort of

35:00

expectation in the championship this

35:03

season then started obviously a week earlier?

35:05

Who do you fancy? You know, people

35:07

like doing those. There's actually great like, it'll wager

35:10

to the start season where you're back like a winner

35:12

or a team kept promoted. But it looked last year like

35:14

the teams who went down last year, I mean, the parachute

35:16

payments have still created a situation where you

35:19

should be strong. I mean, Leeds were unconvinced.

35:21

And you actually got Leicester,

35:23

you imagine Leicester be very strong if

35:25

they keep hold of their, their

35:29

stronger players like Juzbree Hall was excellent

35:30

the weekend. There's new management

35:33

at these clubs as well. So it's sort of harder to glean who's

35:35

actually going to be the rising force

35:38

outside it. Like Norwich, Norwich would

35:40

be sort of half interesting with David

35:43

Wagner there now. Because

35:45

I suppose, I don't know, you still

35:48

feel when it comes to the crunch to Leicester and Leeds

35:50

and Southampton won't be a million miles away. There's nothing, nothing

35:53

revolutionary about state and that I think that's going to be the

35:55

case. But it was a great division last year

35:57

championship from from top to bottom was very,

35:59

very. congested and very tight and I think it'll probably be

36:01

more the same.

36:03

What do you prefer watching the Championship or the Premier League?

36:06

I mean I prefer watching the Premier League but if there's

36:09

two games on side to side and it's like

36:11

St Hampton and Stoke on one side

36:14

and a Premier League game with no Irish players involved on

36:16

the other side I'll watch St Hampton and Stoke. That's

36:18

just my personal interest. Braeburn

36:21

Coffee is the official coffee partner of OTB.

36:23

It is coming to an Apple Green near you and new

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Braeburn locations are popping up every month

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so visit applegreenstores.com forward

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slash Braeburn to find your nearest

36:33

Braeburn Coffee experience. After the

36:35

break, Alan Quinlan's Live in Studio. OTB

36:39

AM Yeah, Alan

36:41

Quinlan in the house with Dan McDonald. Not sure you've

36:43

ever worked together before. Look at the smile on your face.

36:46

I think we've been on. I think we have, yeah. You

36:48

think you have, you're not sure though. We've passed,

36:50

we've certainly passed each other in here

36:52

from, he's probably hopping up out of the chair. Going

36:55

in and then going out. Yeah. I

36:57

do listen to him a lot though. How do you make him? He's

36:59

alright. He's always giving out about rugby. I don't have

37:02

the rugby stock.

37:03

How would you sell rugby to him

37:05

as a sport? I don't know. I have

37:07

friends, heavy big GAA fans

37:09

down in Tipperary. They're

37:12

gone from the rugby since I retired. They

37:14

would have let on that they

37:17

were into the rugby when I was playing and go

37:19

to an odd match and then afterwards it's kind of,

37:22

they've lost all interest. They're giving out

37:24

too much rugby on the back pages. That's

37:28

what Joe Hayes always says to me, the former Tipperary hurler.

37:30

Joe's a great character. Legend. And

37:33

he's

37:35

always giving out about too much rugby,

37:38

too much rugby on the back pages. Where's

37:40

the GAA? But

37:42

yeah, Dan is alright but look, you can

37:44

convert people. We'll have it in a few

37:47

weeks, Johnny. We'll have, if

37:49

Ireland stumble or fail to get past

37:51

the quarter finals in the World Cup, the

37:54

anti-rugby brigade will be out. Yeah,

37:57

well, OK, so what do you make of the game Saturday

37:59

then?

37:59

I suppose one thing

38:02

about rugby over the years has gotten so much more

38:04

physical and these warm up games are really

38:06

a poison chalice. So you look at the

38:08

physical, you want to

38:11

give fringe players a go and once your crowd gets

38:13

on it, I would have Crowley's grand maybe, but some of

38:15

the players that are more

38:17

upfront in terms of forwards

38:19

and that, it's dangerous. What do we learn?

38:23

The reality here is, I think, and Paula

38:26

Connell said it last week in the press conference, Crowley's

38:28

going to play here.

38:29

Are they showing their hands too

38:32

much? No, they're not. I think

38:34

it was bland at times on

38:36

Saturday. Very effective. I

38:38

think when they're leading 21-3 at half time,

38:43

Italy's probably close to

38:45

their strongest team, whereas Ireland's

38:47

was more or less a completely second string

38:49

team. Bar, you know, one or two

38:51

players, obviously Doris in the forwards

38:54

and Henshaw maybe in the back line.

38:58

Otherwise it's

39:00

a second string team. Guys

39:02

trying to impress. I

39:04

think the most important part of

39:07

this run in for Andy Farrell and

39:09

the players is trying to get

39:11

minutes under the belt and

39:13

also avoid injuries. We've seen historically

39:16

from, you

39:17

know, World Cups that there's

39:19

always, there has been always one

39:22

or two players who haven't made it because

39:24

you just look at Italy at the weekend, they've got

39:26

two of their best players, Riccioni at

39:29

tight end. I'm not sure

39:31

what the update is with him, but Menoncello

39:33

in the centre, he's a wonderful player. It

39:36

looked like his shoulder popped out fairly

39:38

innocously. His hand was kind of out

39:40

like strikes. I was watching the weekend, like how does this even

39:42

happen? Who would you believe? I

39:44

saw it many, many years ago with Mike

39:46

Prendergast,

39:47

who's the Munster system, Munster coach. Now we

39:49

played a pre-season friendly back in the

39:51

earlier days of 2001, two or three, somewhere

39:54

around then. I was climbing

39:56

forward at the back of a scrum. He kind of went in

39:59

that position.

39:59

with his hand out like that and kind of barely

40:02

touched the opposition player and I could his shoulder

40:05

just popped out. So it reminded

40:07

me of that. So it's very unfortunate. Felix Jones

40:09

at a bad injury, David Wallace, Tommy

40:11

O'Donnell, Jordan Murphy,

40:14

I think, in previous campaigns.

40:17

So playing Doris to that

40:19

extent, like, and he's obviously amazing, but it's

40:22

risky. Yeah, but you need to get minutes under

40:24

the belt. So will he be, he may, him, what

40:26

his involvement should be in the next few weeks, I don't

40:28

know, but very, he's a phenomenal player.

40:32

So many people online I see wrapping

40:34

in cotton wool, wrapping in cotton wool. Is he,

40:37

where is he in our most important players? He's

40:41

so effective in everything he does

40:43

with the ball and without the ball that he

40:45

has an ability to come up. And to be

40:47

fair, it's a hallmark of a lot of players in this Irish

40:49

squad in the last year and a half, two years. I

40:53

think going back to New Zealand last year, because

40:55

it just keeps coming to my memory the whole time,

40:57

how impressive that second and third test

41:01

was in New Zealand. Kaelin Doris

41:04

had a quiet first game in, in, in

41:06

Auckland. They were, you know, they were beating pretty

41:08

convincably in the first game. There

41:10

was a lot in that game that was fixable,

41:13

that New Zealand got a bit of

41:15

fortune with some of the tries they scored. And

41:19

I remember thinking going out of Eden Park that

41:21

night thinking Kaelin Doris

41:23

was a little bit quiet here. I was a bit disappointed

41:25

because I'm a massive fan of his Jesus.

41:29

He, he responded in, in, in the second

41:31

and third tests with, you know, and

41:34

I think Andy Farrell said that the other day, he's the kind of fellow

41:36

who, if he makes a mistake, he

41:39

just kind of doesn't let it dwell.

41:42

He doesn't drop the head. He nearly

41:44

intensifies his next action,

41:46

if you like. So I think if you're

41:48

looking to a player who's matured and developed

41:51

so well as a real leader in that team and

41:53

how important he is, as you're saying, you

41:56

know, yourself in sports, and if you make a mistake,

41:59

that next five, 10. minutes can be really crucial.

42:02

Some players take longer to kind of get themselves

42:04

back in the game. I probably experienced

42:07

that or I kept running around

42:09

thinking, God, I've just knocked on the ball or I've just missed

42:11

the tackle. He gives you the impression

42:13

that

42:15

it's done. I'm going to make

42:17

a big impact in my next action.

42:20

And he's a wonderful player. On that note, what's Stockdale

42:22

thinking after the missed attack?

42:24

It

42:27

looks bad. Yeah. And

42:29

again, it's I

42:32

felt really sorry for him. You played really well.

42:34

I think Andy Farrell and everybody wants

42:37

him to show

42:39

us

42:40

what he can do like he did before

42:43

in 2018. The energy, the

42:45

excitement, the enthusiasm to

42:47

go forward and

42:50

score tries. I know you can

42:52

hang on to the past. Sometimes we do it and

42:55

that sometimes happens in sport as well. It's

42:57

like a striker who scored 30 goals

43:00

one season and then he's struggling for a couple of

43:02

seasons and everyone he starts moving

43:04

around clubs and people believe they can get

43:06

that back. Jacob Stockdale

43:08

is still a relatively young. He's

43:10

still 25, 26, maybe. I'm not sure exactly

43:13

now, correct me on

43:16

that one. But he's still a

43:18

young player. He's

43:20

still a very, very talented

43:22

player. 27 now actually. 27. But it's still

43:25

relatively young. Yeah. And

43:27

he's well, it'd be easier to be younger

43:29

than he's been around a long time. But

43:31

you think that's kind of age, though, that you're

43:34

really kind of mature and you've become

43:36

you've a lot of experience

43:39

as well. So talk to me about that, though, because if

43:41

he pushes your man inside, basically

43:43

like he's kind of half done his job here. So he's

43:45

really made a Hames of the tackle and one of

43:47

the physically actually superior

43:50

to him as well. So one of one of

43:52

Jacob's kind of.

43:54

MOS or whatever you want

43:56

to say. I wouldn't say problems or issues

43:59

is. that little bit of nastiness

44:02

that you need, that little bit of, now

44:04

James Lowe's missed tackles. You know, you

44:06

go back two years ago over in Cardiff where

44:08

he kind of came in off, made some bad reads.

44:11

But you just think James Lowe's on that left

44:13

wing,

44:15

that fended arm that's coming out

44:17

there. James Lowe, you think is kind of,

44:20

he just has that determination that he's nearly

44:22

breaking your man's arm to stop the fender

44:24

when a guy's out trying to hand you off. And

44:26

we would have trained like that. A lot of it was rugby

44:29

league. If you're running at me and I put

44:31

my hand on your chest, I remember

44:33

Mike Ford who came in and trained us with Ireland

44:36

from rugby league, it was the first time.

44:38

The action was to hit down on the hand quickly

44:41

because if you come with your chest presented,

44:44

you know, I want to hand the guy off

44:46

and it gives you that little bit of momentum to get away.

44:48

So he obviously went in a little bit high.

44:52

The handoff, Pani got the handoff

44:54

on him and scores. And you just think

44:57

that

44:57

that's one that's just, it

45:00

was kind of a bit of a

45:02

one from the crowd that you go, oh no. But

45:04

it's a good thing in the sense that he's like, it's a bad thing for

45:06

him in the match. It's a bad thing for him in the match.

45:08

He needed to make that tackle. He needed

45:11

to, you know, he needed to do everything

45:13

in his power, however you do it. Sometimes, and

45:15

I say to players, if I'm coaching a young kid, sometimes

45:17

tackle technique, everything goes out the window. You just

45:19

jump on a player, you do something, you

45:22

just make sure you make it, you wrap them somewhere.

45:24

But let's not,

45:27

let's not hang, yes, let's

45:29

not hang him out to try here, Jacob's talked. Keith

45:32

Edwards missed the tackle as well, and

45:34

Manoncello, so for the, you

45:36

know, any Ulster listeners, Keith

45:39

Edwards missed the tackle too. There were two bad

45:41

missed tackles. There

45:43

were two tackles that kind of took

45:46

a little bit of air out of the performance,

45:48

the kind of result. I never

45:50

thought, Johnny, that we would see a performance

45:52

here of Free-Flown Rugby. It's

45:55

about getting minutes under the belt, being

45:57

pretty effective, pretty basic

45:59

in the game. Ireland are not going to show

46:01

their hand in the net, even against England and Samoa.

46:03

They won't be showing their hand. Or Romania, probably

46:06

not against Tonga. I think there'll be stuff held back

46:08

here for Scotland and South Africa at big

46:11

games. The biggest thing for me was the out-hand

46:13

situation. I know Crowley looked very much at

46:15

home. He looked assured. He looked very

46:17

assured. He had a few mistakes in him and

46:20

Jacob Stockdale had a couple of mistakes that we mentioned.

46:22

But there were some very positive moments from Jacob Stockdale

46:24

as well. I think there's a lot more in him

46:26

in Stockdale

46:29

and I hope that he looks back

46:31

at his game and he gets

46:33

a chance to do some stuff over in Portugal and learn

46:35

a training camp this week. Who's number two

46:37

without half now?

46:40

It's kind of unfair to go suddenly,

46:42

Jack Crowley is

46:44

gone ahead of Ross Bourne. I think

46:46

that's the perception there now a little bit. He didn't harm

46:49

his prospects. Ross Bourne needs to play the next

46:51

game and start against England, which he

46:53

probably will. And

46:55

he needs to kind of invigorate himself

46:57

a small little bit. Given the ends to

46:59

the season that both out halves had, Crowley

47:02

finished on a very big high

47:05

obviously in monsters run to win in the

47:07

URC. And there was a lot of big moments.

47:10

But I think

47:11

up to the semifinal,

47:14

Jack Crowley was a little bit

47:16

the two performances over in South Africa

47:19

in this round 17 and round 18. He

47:21

came off and both those games for Ben Healy.

47:24

So you just have to be

47:26

careful in the way we propel these guys. I

47:29

think Jack Crowley looked very assured. He's

47:31

still really young. I think he's a confidence

47:34

player and I think there's a lot of good moments in the

47:36

match on Saturday. I think he's ceiling

47:38

and I've said it before is higher maybe

47:40

than Ross Bourne. Ross Bourne

47:44

is a very, very good player. So

47:46

I think it's intriguing the next couple of weeks and they'll

47:48

probably go hard at it in

47:51

training. Of course, Ciaran Frawley came in at Fly

47:54

Half the other day and I think that was an exciting

47:57

prospect as well to see two of them. Crowley

48:00

can be a very effective fullback and there's a lot of people

48:02

talking about, you know, if something happened you go

48:04

Keenan Jimmy O'Brien played there

48:07

at the weekends and He

48:09

got a bang in the shoulder and Jack Crowley goes back

48:11

and plays there. So Um, there

48:13

was that moment as well at the end where they just showed

48:15

come to the end of the game They showed all the subs kind of on

48:17

the sideline looking on you know, jeez some

48:19

talented players there like and you're I mean When

48:22

you think of what Andy Farrell has done,

48:24

I'm not exactly sure maybe Dan knows

48:26

this as a rugby Nourd how

48:28

many players?

48:29

Andy Farrell is captain the

48:32

last couple of years. The number is pretty big. Yeah, what's

48:34

what? Yeah What sorry

48:36

the about say what I wonder what the dynamic is like

48:39

in a group at this stage Like between

48:41

because I know there's all different battles

48:43

going on between like to be a starting

48:46

member But I see Andy Farrell is like naming

48:48

his final squad later than some of the other cultures

48:50

There's like what eight nine lads are going to be cut

48:52

there And i'm sure i'm not sure

48:54

if it's something that you speak about but it's probably the unspoken

48:57

thing that everyone's aware of There's

48:59

a call coming at some stage and some

49:01

of you are gone. Yeah, I remembered those

49:04

calls on a couple of occasions in in particularly

49:07

in You

49:09

know 2003 going

49:11

to australia The

49:15

excitement of waiting for that call when you're

49:17

kind of one of those players who's in that maybe

49:20

from the bracket from

49:24

23 out to that 30

49:26

32 you're one of those seven eight nine ten players

49:29

Um on two occasions. I probably was 2003 I get

49:32

in there. It's incredible probably

49:34

um 2007 was Was

49:38

the most competitive for me and again,

49:40

you know waiting on the fringes. So The

49:43

one thing that would worry me about this

49:46

World Cup is um

49:50

It's only from what happened in all seven and maybe

49:52

we're all tarnished a little by that the players

49:54

who were there paul was There of course. He

49:56

he he's coaching now Is if

49:59

I ask you to pick the Ireland either

50:01

of you to pick the Irish team now and the Irish maybe

50:04

the Irish 23 even if you weren't

50:06

that into rugby you'd go very

50:09

very close that

50:13

happened in all seven when

50:15

basically 15

50:17

players were kept on from the tour to Argentina

50:21

they were literally kept home and they were kind of wrapped and

50:23

caught mull a little bit and obviously

50:27

those players knew that

50:29

they were gonna start they knew

50:31

that they were going to be picked and then it

50:34

was a case for well I don't think it's a problem I

50:36

don't think it's a problem

50:38

it'll be an excuse if we if we come on stock

50:41

I think you

50:43

know they just have to be mindful of the fact that

50:46

most of the players know unless

50:48

something goes drastically wrong or the form

50:50

really dips that they're picked on the team

50:53

so to answer your question that I think that's

50:55

very astute from Andy

50:57

Farrell he's actually dragging this out

50:59

a little bit okay probably is

51:02

this probably something they're mindful of that

51:05

most people could pick this Irish starting team now

51:07

so because he's waiting till after

51:09

some more he's probably keeping them all

51:11

in their best behavior yeah in other words yeah I won't

51:13

drop your standards here because I have my

51:16

mind fully made up yet which you

51:18

know you picked a team now on England

51:20

announced a gesture New Zealand it's South

51:22

Africa announcing today it's a

51:24

couple of weeks out fellas could get a little bit

51:27

I can ease off a little bit in the fitness now we can

51:29

we can go for a few points and choose

51:31

the night or we can sneak out at

51:33

a hotel whatever I'm not saying that it happens

51:35

but I think that's probably yeah it's good

51:37

question like the out of situation like how is

51:39

Sexton relating to all these other guys who are basically

51:41

trying to not only get his spot I would

51:43

imagine he's helping him yeah he probably is

51:46

like to help Crowley in situation on Saturday but there's

51:48

a lot of pressure on Crowley because if he flops here he really

51:50

undermines him like and this is the problem I know you're playing

51:52

Italy but Crowley has to lead to a seven out of ten here

51:54

and I gotta get bring you to this Irish

51:57

examiner Brendan O'Brien if I don't get

51:59

selected because I just

51:59

just play 12, that's just what it

52:02

is, McCloskey. Talk to me. It's

52:04

a difficult position because if you, and

52:07

I think Stuart McCloskey's done very well, going

52:10

back to last November, started

52:13

against South Africa, picked up an injury,

52:15

came back for Australia. Who's

52:19

gonna be picked here? Is he gonna bring four

52:21

centers? That's gonna be the

52:24

intriguing part here. Steve

52:26

Bortig has brought an extra forward, I think he's

52:28

gone 18 forwards,

52:29

is he?

52:33

And 15 backs, I'm not sure. I'll have

52:35

to get the numbers right again. Have

52:38

a look at it again, but you've got Bundy, Yaki,

52:41

Robbie Henshaw, Stuart McCloskey, Gary

52:43

Ringrose, they're kind of the

52:45

four that have been involved

52:48

in the last number years. Obviously McCloskey

52:50

has come into that mix. Jamie Osborn

52:52

is the other center there. So there's five centers

52:54

there. Are they gonna bring three or four?

52:57

I think they're gonna bring three centers, and those

52:59

three centers are Yaki, Henshaw,

53:01

and Gary Ringrose. Quite agonizing, isn't

53:03

it? Because some of the back tree can

53:05

probably move into the center, and Keith

53:09

Earls and Jimmy O'Brien can

53:12

go in and play outside center.

53:14

So Crowley can play at 12 as well.

53:17

So I think, Andy Far,

53:20

I'd say Mike Catt, obviously this is his call,

53:22

I think he'll look at that. Whereas

53:25

if

53:25

you Bundy, Yaki, Robbie Henshaw,

53:28

Stuart McCloskey, and Gary Ringrose, there's probably

53:30

only one out of that four that can go

53:32

into the back three, and that's Gary Ringrose. So

53:37

it's a difficult one, and it's gonna

53:39

be a tough decision, but

53:43

it's gonna be hard if Stuart McCloskey doesn't make

53:45

it, because I think he's shown a lot

53:47

in the last 12 months and what

53:49

he's done, but it's pretty competitive

53:51

there, right across the board,

53:54

and I think he's someone that

53:56

unfortunately could miss out on it.

53:59

Just after St. Patrick's Day

54:02

and also the first time I were playing only three World Cup

54:04

warm-up games, they have that Portugal camp. So

54:06

far it is basically saying we don't really need

54:08

that many games.

54:11

That's because you've got Romania. Yeah.

54:14

With all due respect, you know what I mean? They

54:18

can move up the gears in that

54:20

situation. So Africa won the World Cup

54:22

last time with a lot of games

54:25

and going pretty earlier than anyone to Japan.

54:29

Look,

54:31

I've said this about pre-seasons.

54:34

If you go well and things go right,

54:36

it's the

54:38

best decisions were made.

54:40

If we're analysing this and no matter

54:43

what happens in the World Cup, Johnny,

54:45

if Ireland get out of the group, you're playing

54:47

France and New Zealand. You're kind of flicking a coin.

54:51

Obviously if Ireland are bringing brilliant

54:53

form into a quarter-final,

54:56

if they're there, Scotland are going to have

54:58

a big say in this, you

55:00

get more enthusiastic and you're kind of really

55:02

breaking it down then and saying, well, this is –

55:05

they're playing well or this is

55:07

their big strength. I think where

55:11

they'll be in a better position this time is I

55:13

think they'll be quite calm about the

55:16

challenge in a sense that

55:18

they'll have confidence and belief in themselves.

55:21

But again, it's on the day. France

55:23

are going to have so much momentum with it

55:25

being over there. New Zealand,

55:27

what we've seen in them in the last couple of weeks,

55:30

it's kind of frightening prospect for –

55:33

Where

55:34

are they at? If possible, if Ireland are there. Briefly

55:38

now because you're like people have this – it's in France,

55:40

so it's kind of between Ireland and France. We have an edge over

55:42

New Zealand, but clearly it's not that straightforward. It's

55:44

not. No. New Zealand,

55:47

I think they showed a couple of weeks ago for 20 minutes

55:49

against South Africa in

55:52

the rugby championship, the first weekend. It

55:55

was phenomenal for the first 20, 25 minutes

55:57

of that game.

55:59

can do that. They can bring that pace,

56:02

that intensity, that quality. They

56:05

had a bad 2022, you know,

56:09

culminating in that series last to

56:11

Ireland. The Rugby Championship did a couple of

56:13

bad losses, but

56:15

they're capable. And I think you can see

56:18

there's a stamp of Joe Schmidt in this team. No,

56:20

they're far. I think, and I said it

56:23

after the tour in New Zealand, they kind of rely

56:25

on this brilliant X Factor to rip teams apart.

56:29

It didn't work in the second and third tests for

56:31

Ireland because Ireland were so stable

56:34

and connected defensively and stopped

56:37

them at source. And then they

56:39

didn't really kind of know what to do. Now

56:42

they seem to have great timing

56:44

in their passes. Their breakdown is really effective

56:47

again. It does Joe Schmidt all over this

56:49

team. So I think he's obviously

56:51

had time to bet in there and couldn't

56:54

rule New Zealand out of in any

56:56

game. But I think even more so now what

56:58

we've seen

56:59

in the last couple of weeks from them. Thanks for your time.

57:01

Cheers. Off the ball is coming to the Cork

57:04

Podcast Festival. Join us on 27th

57:06

of August, the Cork Opera House special guest,

57:08

Jimmy Barry Murphy.

57:09

More guests to be announced very soon. Don't miss out on what's going

57:12

to be a brilliant night in the heart of the Rebel

57:14

County. For tickets, go to www.corkpodcastfestival.ie

57:19

forward slash off dash

57:22

dash forward slash off

57:25

dash the dash ball forward

57:27

slash. Speaking to Cork, this always reminds me of

57:29

the story of your man ringing the fella

57:31

from the county board as the internet was just getting

57:33

gone. And he's like, you find it there in the

57:35

website and the fella from the county board was what's

57:37

the address and your man goes, www. And

57:39

he

57:39

goes, hang on, how many W's?

57:42

Speaking of Cork, we have Sarah Donovan standing

57:44

by. Yeah, honest question,

57:46

Sarah. Dan and I want the answer to this. Is she

57:48

actually from Cork?

57:50

I mean, clearly

57:53

there's something she's you must have a mother from like

57:55

Mayo or something. Don't know

57:57

what the serial winner is for Mayo. Just

58:00

doesn't know. I should have three goals, two goals, whatever. I

58:02

don't know. What happened there? Well, St. Vincent's

58:06

will claim her. I think they have.

58:13

Yeah, we might have some dodgy

58:16

Wi-Fi. Is that a cork Wi-Fi you're going to have?

58:18

Why would you say is she from cork? How? How

58:20

would you say she's not from cork? Because she's too

58:22

modest. Oh, OK. You know what I mean? Cork

58:25

people, they don't like confidence. I thought you

58:27

were out of there. Call them there. Like, I'm only here because I'm

58:29

so afraid. How do you know someone's from cork? Like,

58:31

they tell you. That type of thing. Cork

58:33

by the way. There's an element to that. But... Yeah.

58:35

Someone's from cork, they tell you. But there

58:38

is an element to that. But like... Nobody knows what you're from

58:40

now. Oh, like, this seems to be your occurring

58:42

point. Yeah. This is it. It seems to be your occurring

58:44

point. We're trying to get Sarah back. There are

58:46

a lot of issues in cork the moment involving Wi-Fi,

58:49

obviously. Yeah, but I don't know. Like, I mean, I

58:51

suggest that all cork people are just in your face,

58:53

then, about their talent. I don't really get your

58:55

point here. You've met it a couple of times. I

58:58

think it's extraordinary that somebody might get

59:00

a hat-trick and just kind

59:03

of went over her head, like, but that's... That's

59:05

her job. Roy Keane, what are you there to do?

59:07

Roy Keane. I'm there to score goals. That's her job. Yeah, that's

59:10

what she's doing. It's not really her job. Sarah, he's

59:12

channeling his inner Roy Keane here.

59:14

Well, look, actually, I read Emor Ryan's book

59:16

at the weekend, The Grass Ceiling, and

59:19

I think it might explain a lot about the cork people.

59:22

She's from the Midlands, obviously. She's from

59:24

Woneegall. And she described

59:26

the cork dressing room as far more flamboyant

59:29

than the Woneegall dressing room. These

59:31

are the bars girls in the city. So she

59:34

used the word flamboyant, so I'm going to go with that. That's

59:36

very complimentary,

59:37

we'll say. Dan,

59:40

can you... What did you make of the Kamoagie

59:42

spectacle? Big crowds. Obviously,

59:45

I

59:46

guess they're trying to get on to the ladies'

59:48

level, but this is potential, I think. Well, look,

59:51

we spoke to Sarah about it on Thursday,

59:53

I think it was. I mean, the crowd

59:56

is upwards of 30,000 for the first time since 2007.

59:59

I was just thinking about that as well. Like I suppose,

1:00:02

you look at it is compared

1:00:04

with the football final, but I think Sarah

1:00:06

mentioned it, you've often had Dublin or Meath involved.

1:00:09

Generally there's more traveling involved. I know the

1:00:12

weekend event, there's other finals on as well too,

1:00:14

so it's not just about two teams.

1:00:17

But it always

1:00:19

strikes me as odd that there's that discrepancy

1:00:21

between the crowd figures, but I suppose geography can

1:00:24

explain a bit and maybe there's

1:00:26

more politics around promotion and stuff that

1:00:28

Sarah's way better placed and the need

1:00:30

to reverse. But it seems to be a step

1:00:33

in the right direction at least. Yeah,

1:00:36

I thought you'd be delighted with the crowd Sarah considering.

1:00:38

I think, again, Kamorgi's really

1:00:40

at its infancy here in terms of where it could be, I think.

1:00:43

It's niche. Yeah. It's

1:00:45

niche. It's played in

1:00:47

less places well than hurling is. And

1:00:49

we've talked about the hurling struggles all of the time. So

1:00:52

you only have three

1:00:54

teams who've consistently

1:00:56

competed in the competition since, say, 2012.

1:01:00

It was Waterford's first time appearing in

1:01:03

the finals since 1945. Other

1:01:06

teams had failed, like Wexford

1:01:08

were the last team to get there in 2012. And

1:01:10

since then it's been Cork, Kilkenny Galway, Cork,

1:01:12

Kilkenny Galway. And the second teams

1:01:15

of Cork, Kilkenny Galway kept appearing in the intermediate

1:01:17

final, which meant the numbers were halved

1:01:19

again. You know, this weekend we had six different

1:01:22

counties involved, so you'd six different

1:01:24

chances to get as many people there as you could.

1:01:27

So I thought they did really, really well to get

1:01:29

over 30,000 people there this weekend. And

1:01:32

hats off to them for that.

1:01:34

Comment in from Colin McCarthy. Kamorgi

1:01:36

should be on the day before the hurling. A ticket to the hurling

1:01:39

final should get you into the Kamorgi and

1:01:41

they can get better at tenances up, make a weekend

1:01:43

of it. What do you make of that?

1:01:47

Dan, I was saying to you last week, the League

1:01:49

of Ireland doesn't get the same questions about why

1:01:51

their showpiece competition is only at 30,000.

1:01:55

What's the fixation

1:01:56

on it? Like if

1:01:58

the League of Ireland's FA competition, is the

1:02:01

best competition in the country is

1:02:03

only hitting 30,000.

1:02:06

Is this an issue that

1:02:08

we're making more of an issue

1:02:09

of? I'm sorry, Dan, go ahead. No, no,

1:02:11

I was a little bit like, listen, my point is, and I said it's out of sync, it's

1:02:14

more to me, I think there's too much of a focus on

1:02:16

the one day. That's a

1:02:18

big part of the Irish sport mentality

1:02:21

is to have the one day attendance. And like, personally,

1:02:23

for me, even like, you know, the ladies football

1:02:26

finals say, you'll get a big figure and as always, well, this

1:02:28

is the biggest event in Europe that day.

1:02:30

I'm looking at that going, okay, that's great, but

1:02:33

you've done a big promotion for today, you

1:02:35

know, and like, you know, running buses and that's brilliant.

1:02:38

But to me, surely it's about more consistency

1:02:40

and stuff like that. Like League of Honor-wise, for example, the

1:02:42

best thing this year is the attendances are up week on week

1:02:45

all of the time. And like the cup

1:02:47

final, yeah, sometimes we think, yeah, they should fill

1:02:49

it by doing more promotion around

1:02:51

that event. But I don't know how I feel sometimes about

1:02:53

tagging something onto a weekend. I think

1:02:55

you need to make it the main event

1:02:58

of the weekend rather than making it the

1:03:00

undercard to something else. Yeah, absolutely.

1:03:03

That would be my opinion. There could be different opinions. Well,

1:03:05

Sarah, what I'm watching, so

1:03:07

I was the highlights last night, the Camogie and it's

1:03:09

the

1:03:09

same thing in Ireland, except it's amplified.

1:03:12

How do you get this sport out

1:03:14

to all corners of Ireland? Because Camogie could

1:03:16

be exceptional across all corners of Ireland.

1:03:19

And then I'm thinking like, what has this done for

1:03:21

Waterford Camogie in the sense that it's an absolute

1:03:23

obliteration. The first half kind of went against

1:03:25

him. Does it, you

1:03:28

know, it wasn't the showcase

1:03:30

that you wanted in terms of that competitiveness.

1:03:33

The Camogie Association are at fault here.

1:03:35

And I'd be very critical of that. They didn't

1:03:37

see to the competition. It

1:03:39

was last year two groups of

1:03:42

six with, you know, the top four

1:03:44

coming out and it was seeded. This

1:03:46

year it was three groups of four. Waterford

1:03:49

were in the third group, we'll say they

1:03:51

trounced, awfully limerick and

1:03:53

tantrum. And they came into a

1:03:56

semifinal and beat a very fancy

1:03:58

tip team in horrible conditions and all of Park

1:04:00

and I will say to Dan's point there was seven and a half thousand

1:04:02

people in Nolan Park for the both semi-finals

1:04:04

which adds to your point you know it's not just

1:04:07

the showpiece that was getting the big numbers but

1:04:09

they beat Tip by a point. Tip were devastated

1:04:12

because they genuinely thought they were in the final

1:04:14

I think

1:04:15

and then they go into the final and Grace Walsh made

1:04:17

a great point on the show

1:04:18

on Sunday night there was

1:04:20

no experience none of the players

1:04:23

in that

1:04:24

Waterford team had any experience of playing

1:04:26

in a

1:04:27

senior All-Ireland final in Croke Park

1:04:30

of the Cork team 12 players had All-Ireland

1:04:33

medals already. The Camogie

1:04:35

Association if they had seeded the competition

1:04:38

wouldn't have had that pairing but

1:04:40

then they wouldn't have had 30,000 people in Croke Park so

1:04:43

were they looking for the numbers or were they looking for the quality

1:04:46

and the

1:04:47

blame lies with them.

1:04:48

On Cork themselves

1:04:51

obviously it was a hell of a performance

1:04:53

not to mention Amy and all of like

1:04:56

all of the Cork team can say more

1:04:58

or less like they were dominant from start to finish.

1:05:01

Just looking at it so you've Liam

1:05:03

Cronin and Michelle O'Connor coming in maybe

1:05:05

accredited with change of form where did this

1:05:07

happen from their league sort of performances and

1:05:10

how did how did they actually peak at the right time I suppose.

1:05:13

So they've lost to

1:05:15

Galway pretty much consistently over

1:05:18

the last number of years Galway were identified as their bogey

1:05:20

team and in the league final this year they had a chance

1:05:23

I suppose to put that to bed right

1:05:25

but

1:05:26

they didn't go well in Croke Park. If you were to watch

1:05:28

the game in Croke Park on Sunday and

1:05:31

the game in Croke Park on Easter weekend two

1:05:34

completely different games and a completely different

1:05:36

style of play from Cork. They were over

1:05:38

carrying the ball they were holding up the ball in the delivery

1:05:41

zones their inside line was absolutely

1:05:43

starved of ball in that league final. Galway

1:05:46

incredibly well set up defensively

1:05:49

and every time the ball went in and it was

1:05:51

taking two long to go in the backs were coming out with the ball.

1:05:54

Fast forward to this weekend

1:05:56

and Cork's distribution was

1:05:59

outstanding.

1:05:59

But not just from Hannah Looney who had 18 possessions.

1:06:02

It was Maeve Callan. It was Izzy

1:06:05

O'Regan.

1:06:05

It was Laura Tracy. It was a complete

1:06:08

performance from Cork.

1:06:09

The amount of ball that Katrina

1:06:12

Mackey and Amy O'Connor got, Amy O'Connor

1:06:14

had 10 possessions and she scored 3-7.

1:06:16

Mackey had 11 possessions, hit

1:06:19

two points, but she assisted in the two goals. Massively

1:06:22

unselfish play from Mackey, but

1:06:25

4-10 from the insightful forward line with

1:06:27

Sirkum McCartan

1:06:27

in the game. Talk

1:06:30

to me about Sirkum McCartan as well, this remarkable

1:06:33

down background as

1:06:35

well, which is probably bridging a 44-year

1:06:37

gap here.

1:06:39

Yeah, well with her dad, obviously

1:06:41

famous down footballer, she

1:06:43

was coming to Cork for placement and

1:06:46

Eagle Eyes and Cork recognised the name

1:06:48

and parachuted her into

1:06:50

the bars in Cork. They

1:06:53

didn't waste time parachuting her into the Cork set up.

1:06:56

I suppose I've played down over the

1:06:58

years with Dublin and with

1:07:00

Cork actually in all-island finals and

1:07:03

there's a pocket in Ulster that really loves its

1:07:05

Kamoghi. So you've got Niamh

1:07:07

Malin as well from

1:07:09

down would be very similar to Beth Carton

1:07:11

in the amount of work she gets through in games. So

1:07:13

real quality in that down set up. So for

1:07:15

one of down's players to come to Cork,

1:07:18

Cork were quickly on getting her involved in the squad

1:07:21

and you could see when she celebrated her goal

1:07:23

on Sunday, what it meant to her. And I suppose

1:07:25

how she's been enveloped by the Cork set

1:07:27

up and how she's been welcomed.

1:07:29

Where do Watford go from here

1:07:31

and like for Sean Power, like

1:07:33

what do you say in the address from after that because

1:07:36

it's so, so deflating?

1:07:38

It's a 19 point loss, lads.

1:07:41

From last week, I don't know, did you sense

1:07:43

my nervousness last week or Dan, you might

1:07:46

have. I said six, but

1:07:48

I was afraid that it was going to be more. I

1:07:51

said the Cork would win by at least six and winning

1:07:54

by 19 was on the cards last

1:07:56

week because I suppose defensively they.

1:07:59

didn't have the same quality in their defensive six.

1:08:02

Individually, very good Kamogi players, but they

1:08:05

didn't have the experience of Kit Kenny. They didn't have the experience

1:08:07

of Galway. That's been built up over the

1:08:09

course of 10 years, you know? So, you can't

1:08:11

just put that into a team

1:08:14

in the space of three months. And they lost

1:08:16

Vicky Faulkner after two and a half minutes. And I was

1:08:18

saying, you know, Iona Heffernan, who was

1:08:21

on the bench, I don't even think she'd gotten

1:08:23

around to the idea that she was going to be in after two and a half

1:08:25

minutes. So, all of a sudden, she's parachuted

1:08:28

in to mark, you know, one of the Cork

1:08:29

forwards. Amy O'Connor sees

1:08:32

a chink of breathing space because

1:08:34

Vicky Faulkner's gone and she's the ball over

1:08:36

the bar in the next exchange. Everything

1:08:38

went wrong for Watford. But ultimately,

1:08:41

they wouldn't have been fast enough and they weren't prepared enough.

1:08:43

And that goes with the Kamogi.

1:08:45

I was in Malow yesterday at the

1:08:47

races. So, I got the train home and there was obviously

1:08:49

all the red and white flags and I was waiting maybe

1:08:51

four to five minutes to train. So, I went into the waiting room and

1:08:53

did all these photos of past Cork

1:08:56

winners of all Ireland's and it was going back

1:08:58

to like Mulcahy and Jimmy

1:09:00

Barry Murphy and you had then the Kamogi players as

1:09:02

well. And it was really cool to see and it

1:09:05

wouldn't be the examiner without Rebel

1:09:07

Rain drowed over, Ark Hark now set

1:09:09

to dominate Kamogi. And this is always a question

1:09:13

after obviously demolition like that. But

1:09:15

it's not as straightforward as that's there either. And

1:09:18

like Kenny and Galway and Tim are watching home

1:09:21

saying, right, that's not going to happen to us next year.

1:09:23

But this Cork team hadn't won since 2018.

1:09:25

And I know Hannah Looney described it as a

1:09:27

famine in Cork, but that group had done,

1:09:30

you're looking at a hundred sessions a year, right? For

1:09:32

six years, they'd done a hundred sessions. They were up on 600 sessions

1:09:35

and they hadn't

1:09:36

won the trophy

1:09:38

that they were looking for. It could

1:09:41

be, you know, domination for the next six

1:09:44

years. Are those girls who've spent six

1:09:46

years trying to get back to

1:09:48

the

1:09:48

Hogan stand could decide, I don't

1:09:51

have enough to give. Yeah, like there will there will be an

1:09:54

erosion of the panel in

1:09:56

some way. The Cork were very lucky to have Katrina

1:09:58

Mackey and Pamela Mackey. back in the squad,

1:10:01

because they've been around the squad far beyond

1:10:04

that group that's there now. Their

1:10:07

career spans over a decade. So

1:10:11

swings and roundabouts, they took them so much to

1:10:13

get here and win. It may

1:10:15

not be that they'll all stick

1:10:17

around in the next couple of years. So I suppose

1:10:20

the only other thing that I'll say to that is

1:10:22

the bench that Cork were able to bring on, they've 20

1:10:25

or 25 players that are at that

1:10:27

level, that Watford aren't at. So Cork

1:10:30

certainly have an opportunity here if they

1:10:32

stay in a bed-in. Maybe they'll get

1:10:34

a three in a row, but we haven't

1:10:35

done it. Dan has a young daughter

1:10:38

and I imagine she's going to have plenty of options,

1:10:40

plenty of options as to what sport she wants to play as

1:10:42

she gets older.

1:10:44

How does the association sell

1:10:47

this sport? Because I was just looking at this game

1:10:49

on Sunday. It is so remarkable in so

1:10:51

many ways and really, really unique,

1:10:54

but it's so peripheral. It

1:10:57

has to start from somewhere

1:11:00

and it's a big philosophical question. It's

1:11:02

a big organization question for the organization,

1:11:05

but this sport has to be sold because

1:11:07

it should have so much going for it.

1:11:09

So

1:11:10

the Camoggi Association and the Ladies Football are

1:11:13

incredibly lucky that from the period

1:11:15

of about five until 10 or 11, the

1:11:17

mini leagues

1:11:19

comprises both boys and girls. So

1:11:21

once girls are into

1:11:24

a G.A. club structure, for the first

1:11:26

five or six years, it's run by the G.A.

1:11:28

and they have full exposure. They have all of

1:11:30

the same resources. And then

1:11:32

it gets tricky after age 10 when the girls

1:11:35

have to branch off because then you're relying

1:11:37

on coaches, you're relying on club resources,

1:11:40

and it just depends on how strong the Camoggi

1:11:42

club or the Ladies Football Club or whether there's a one club

1:11:45

model in the club.

1:11:47

That's the point where

1:11:48

the Camoggi and Ladies Football have to step in and

1:11:51

really look at how they're

1:11:53

coaching it. I had a text from an old

1:11:56

colleague of mine from Dave Maranose yesterday.

1:11:59

in Dublin.

1:12:02

And he said, brilliantly well organized, but

1:12:05

it was all men, all coaches,

1:12:07

all male coaches, all male managers with the groups

1:12:10

of girls. And we're incredibly

1:12:12

lucky that, you know, dads like Dan are going

1:12:14

to pick up the, I suppose,

1:12:17

work with their daughters and, you know, coach them

1:12:19

to be athletes and

1:12:21

sports women. But

1:12:23

the Comodia Association really needs to drive this

1:12:25

in terms of getting players and former

1:12:27

players back to the pitch. And, you

1:12:30

know, involved in coaching. So

1:12:32

it's a very, very hard thing to do, but I think you

1:12:35

have to see women on the pitch, on

1:12:37

the sidelines for it really to grow. Where

1:12:39

are you living in Dublin again, sir? I moved

1:12:41

to Cork. You're back in Cork, yeah. I'm back in

1:12:43

Cork, yeah. But I was managing my Nogues,

1:12:46

named my Nogues last year

1:12:47

in Dublin for a year. Lovely. I thought you

1:12:49

were part of the big move to Dublin

1:12:51

there. Listen, thanks for your time.

1:12:53

Thank you very much, guys. We haven't seen a few live comments just,

1:12:56

I want to give Michael, I passed by Lansdowne

1:12:58

on Sunday. A lot of dads with daughters going to the game,

1:13:00

which is great to see. Yeah,

1:13:02

it's funny, that kind of gets to even what we're talking about there

1:13:04

in the Comodia. Edward Freeman, Liverpool

1:13:07

beat man City in the charity shield last year. It didn't

1:13:09

work out too bad. For City, Fergus Q, Orange

1:13:11

has a negative connotation. It tends

1:13:13

to mean baddish. Arsenal and Ireland did grand,

1:13:16

but shouldn't be in the rankings at all. The

1:13:18

Carpet Man, sending out a Mickey Mouse team at

1:13:20

the Aviva is exactly what those fans deserve,

1:13:23

who don't have the same passion of

1:13:25

LOI teams. It's actually good to bring you into this,

1:13:27

JD, because I know you're not going to relate to that.

1:13:31

Relate to that in what way? Good morning. Well,

1:13:33

if you're JD's in the house,

1:13:37

if you're not brought up in a kind of a, I was

1:13:39

brought up following Liverpool, as were 99% of kids in

1:13:41

Ireland were brought up following English

1:13:44

teams. And then you are indoctrinated as I

1:13:46

was, and most kids became Liverpool

1:13:48

and Man United fans as it was. And you can't say, oh,

1:13:51

don't be going watching the Mickey Mouse friendly, because if

1:13:53

I were a kid, I would have loved to see Liverpool in

1:13:55

Dublin. Well, it's all that minutes, isn't it?

1:13:58

I was out of work here. on

1:14:00

Sunday and I was going to Malahide

1:14:02

and I had to wait for about four trains

1:14:04

to go past and all the trains were full.

1:14:06

It was like the tube in London of Man United fans

1:14:08

going up to the north side of Dublin and I got

1:14:11

on the train once again. Are you saying London is full of Manchester United

1:14:13

fans as well? Yeah, probably is. That's

1:14:16

a dig in its own way. So it's

1:14:18

real and the streets are full of Man United

1:14:20

fans so it is real.

1:14:22

Yeah, no one's done it's real.

1:14:24

To me the talking point of the weekend

1:14:26

is not denying the sport that's there. It's

1:14:29

just a misfortune that they didn't

1:14:31

get valuable experience

1:14:33

that they believed they were

1:14:35

paying for. Now I would make the point, I still think if it was advertised

1:14:38

as like a Manchester United team was coming

1:14:40

in and it's going to be a success. It's

1:14:42

still a selection. It still would have sold out in my

1:14:44

opinion but at least you know people would

1:14:47

have known and I think maybe the pricing might have been different.

1:14:49

As we know it's different, it's expensive to do a lot of things

1:14:51

in Dublin now and you saw people, a lot of comments

1:14:53

of people who spent like €300 on

1:14:56

Sunday, you know as a family spending

1:14:58

a lot of money and you want

1:15:00

to get a sense that you're getting what you thought you were paying

1:15:02

for. Question for you, do the FAI have any influence on

1:15:04

that game? Well definitely get

1:15:06

a flat fee. Could

1:15:09

you not suggest it to be League of Ireland team against

1:15:11

Man United? I don't think that would have made a difference really.

1:15:14

I think the broader issue is of the

1:15:17

marquee team that you bring, how it

1:15:19

works is the FAI will get a flat fee

1:15:21

from promoters and the promoters will get the

1:15:24

talent. The FAI will

1:15:26

get the fee, the VV stadium and then

1:15:29

you bring in the teams. The same with Celtic and Wolves. The week

1:15:32

before it was relocated from Korea for some reason.

1:15:35

But clearly sometimes with those games there's terms

1:15:37

and conditions and my point would be like when the

1:15:40

United were in the States there would have been certain

1:15:42

obligations you would feel at certain places

1:15:44

and Dublin while it remains

1:15:47

a massive hotbed. It's not a place where they can

1:15:49

go somewhere else. It's

1:15:51

not as

1:15:59

if there's going to be big demands. demands, you have to play your stars

1:16:01

in Dublin. But the organizers could try and put that in. They

1:16:03

could try and say, as part of the contract for this game,

1:16:06

you have to bring X amount of first-teamers.

1:16:09

But clearly, that didn't happen in this instance.

1:16:12

And I think a week out from the season, it's probably... Look,

1:16:14

I understand that. I was also at the Pedicaine 24. Yeah,

1:16:16

exactly. Which was an announced subsequent

1:16:19

to the Dublin one. Now,

1:16:21

again, they played that split weekend. Last year,

1:16:23

they did exactly the same thing. They played Saturday, Sunday.

1:16:25

So I suppose the forum was there. It

1:16:27

was easy to see how this would happen.

1:16:29

But clearly, when it comes...

1:16:32

I think, to me, the issue is more with how the game was

1:16:34

solved, as opposed... It's not saying Manchester

1:16:36

and anything wrong. It's not to be less than that. Briefly,

1:16:38

J.D. Lee McDwar. Booing Maguire

1:16:40

was pathetic. Granted, it was mostly kids.

1:16:43

I just think he is almost a pantomime villain at this

1:16:45

stage. He will

1:16:47

move on as Ten Hags made it obvious that

1:16:49

he isn't wanted. If you were an adult at Land's

1:16:51

Round Road and you spent some of your weekend

1:16:53

booing Maguire, I don't know.

1:16:56

I just find this absolutely pathetic.

1:16:58

What do you make of it? Well, the world's gone toxic anyway.

1:17:00

Toxic? What are you doing? Well,

1:17:03

people are booing David Goff. Dublin fans are

1:17:05

booing David Goff at the All-Arden Final. We just won

1:17:07

the All-Arden Final. Booing referee.

1:17:10

So, I don't know. People just need to cop themselves on generally.

1:17:12

Human being as well. What example

1:17:14

is this to kids? Literally saying

1:17:16

you can just

1:17:17

mock a guy in front of... He's a human being.

1:17:19

I don't care what money he's on. He's living a life

1:17:21

that's not enough. But also, he's at work. He's at work. Yeah.

1:17:23

I just find this... I

1:17:25

don't know. It's so sad. It's so, so

1:17:27

sad. What is in the news? Well,

1:17:30

we've got the Women's World Cup kicking off, the last 16

1:17:33

final matches, Columbia, Jamaica at 9 o'clock.

1:17:35

And then we've got France against Morocco at noon,

1:17:38

England, the winners of the Columbia, Jamaica game. I think

1:17:41

we were on our first division yesterday, got away with Beijing

1:17:43

Treaty United 3-0. It's interesting that

1:17:45

second to fifth will play off. So, our own

1:17:47

Cheyenne Keegan... Having a great team. You

1:17:50

know, they drew two all at Kerry. And the Waterford are going to finish

1:17:52

second. They beat Wexford 1-0. But they're not guaranteed

1:17:54

a place in the primary

1:17:55

division next season. Harry Kane,

1:17:57

the sub-apric continues there.

1:17:59

turning down an 86 million bid from Byron for cocaine.

1:18:02

What do you think will happen? I really have

1:18:05

no idea. I think you probably at this stage, you probably stay. Like

1:18:07

it's a week out from the season and you want to start the season

1:18:09

with the club he's going to be at. Do you want to, remember

1:18:11

you reached a point last year, you were like, I

1:18:14

just let him go. I reached that point. Let him, let

1:18:16

him, just let him fly away. Yeah. You're still there.

1:18:19

I would be, yeah. I think he deserves our blessing

1:18:21

and to go, but it feels like, it's a

1:18:23

gamble for Spurs either way. You keep them, you

1:18:25

could get in the Champions League next season. You

1:18:27

sell them, you get the 80 million, but you don't have time, really,

1:18:29

to buy players. West Ham understood

1:18:32

to have tables, 50 million for Maguire and

1:18:34

Scott McTominay from Manchester United. Romeo

1:18:36

LaVia, Liverpool are trying to get him. They've had a third bid

1:18:39

turned down from Southampton. Kieran McGinney

1:18:41

is to stay at Armagh for a tenth season.

1:18:44

And Brian, Durer and Fergallone are going to stay on

1:18:46

in Tyrone for another three years, it seems. Yeah,

1:18:48

wow.

1:18:49

Which is a vote of confidence to

1:18:51

them. Look, they won't be all Ireland in 2021, but they've had a

1:18:53

couple of disappointing seasons, Tyrone. And

1:18:55

we have Ross Common racing there at half five this

1:18:57

evening. Thank you, JD. All right, lads. Speaking

1:19:00

to you on Saturday. Yeah, it's all back, Dan. It

1:19:03

is. It's back. Just a different order. JD

1:19:05

can call the shots and you can do the links. A

1:19:08

new order. Yeah. You're very comfortable in that

1:19:10

chair, I have to say. Yeah, it's swinging around here. Yeah.

1:19:13

Making it warm for JD. There

1:19:16

we go. Back on, what, five days' time?

1:19:18

Yeah, it's hard to believe it's back.

1:19:19

Andy Mitten, are

1:19:21

you ready for the new season? Yeah.

1:19:24

Looking forward to it. It's like, can you make it sound

1:19:26

any more exciting than that? I'm

1:19:28

still jet lagged. I know you all believe me. And

1:19:31

I know I was. We have a lot

1:19:33

of first world problems on this show today. People

1:19:35

spending too much money being jet lagged, but

1:19:37

you are tired.

1:19:39

Get your small violin out. I'm sure

1:19:41

you're interested, but that's it. But yeah, I woke up at 10

1:19:43

past 3 this morning and couldn't get back to sleep.

1:19:46

I thought that going to Dublin at the weekend

1:19:48

and having a few pints of Guinness would sort of reset

1:19:51

me. And it sort of did. But yeah,

1:19:53

I'm back to square one now. But I am looking forward

1:19:55

to it genuinely. And I'll be old traffic

1:19:57

on Monday night for Manchester United's first

1:19:59

gate.

1:19:59

against wolves and I'm

1:20:02

pretty optimistic. So

1:20:04

if you have insomnia at three

1:20:07

in the morning, do you, what's your tactic

1:20:09

here? Do you like force yourself to try to sleep

1:20:11

or do you end up like everyone just going on their phone and making

1:20:13

it worse?

1:20:16

It's complicated by two young

1:20:18

kids who like getting up in the night

1:20:21

and I don't really have a tactic because

1:20:23

I don't normally have this. I've not had jet lag

1:20:25

for four

1:20:28

or five years and I'm surprised

1:20:30

how much it hit me but I'm not the only one, so many

1:20:32

other people who flew back from the States last week

1:20:34

are also struggling with it.

1:20:37

So I'm just hoping that we'll get normalized.

1:20:40

I've got to finish off the

1:20:41

first United We stand to the season by today.

1:20:44

I'm on deadline and

1:20:46

well, I've got to do it. I've got no other choice. I can't

1:20:48

sell the printer that I'm jet lagged and can't send it to

1:20:50

print, can I? So I've got to

1:20:52

be done. I'm hoping I'm going to tie myself out and

1:20:54

then go to bed at one point and

1:20:56

just sleep for eight hours. That's my dream.

1:20:59

How was the Dublin experience then from

1:21:01

your perspective Andy? I know there's been a debate

1:21:03

here, tell you a lot of some disappointed

1:21:06

Irish fans who weren't expecting

1:21:08

the split friendlies, although I know

1:21:10

Manchester United did the same thing last year, but just

1:21:13

maybe the timing of announcements, maybe Jared with

1:21:15

some people. I mean, how was the occasion

1:21:18

for you?

1:21:21

For me personally, I loved it. We did a gig

1:21:23

at the Sugar Club on Saturday night and

1:21:26

that went well. I liked the city

1:21:28

a lot. I liked the Guinness, found a

1:21:30

good pub called Hartigan's I think.

1:21:33

What an absolute banger. That's a good find.

1:21:35

Banger, absolute banger. You'll never want to go anywhere

1:21:37

else.

1:21:38

And you went to the Sugar Club anyway. And

1:21:41

yeah, and a group of gentlemen

1:21:43

were just sat around the table just jamming

1:21:45

with their instruments and I just thought, this

1:21:47

is magnificent. And I spoke

1:21:49

to one of them. He said, where are you from? I said, I'm from

1:21:52

Manchester. And he said, give me five minutes. And

1:21:55

then he started playing matchstick men in

1:21:58

tribute to L.S. Lowry from Salford.

1:21:59

And it was just

1:22:02

wonderful. And there's a real

1:22:04

connection, though, with northern English lads

1:22:07

and Irish people. It just works.

1:22:09

Yeah, yeah, it does. I mean, I was with

1:22:11

some friends as well. And

1:22:13

we had a great time. You're pretty famous

1:22:16

off the ball. You know, loads of people come up to me

1:22:18

and say, yeah, we see it going off

1:22:20

the ball. So yeah, I

1:22:23

realize that you don't get that when you're walking around

1:22:26

San Diego. But the point

1:22:28

about the

1:22:29

about fans being unhappy,

1:22:32

I wouldn't just say some. I

1:22:34

got it nonstop. So I stood on the

1:22:36

road selling United Re-Stand. Before

1:22:40

the game against lawns on Saturday,

1:22:42

I got wind of the team and I tweeted it's

1:22:44

going to be a very strong team. And

1:22:47

that just set people off because people

1:22:49

then thought that it wouldn't be a strong team the following

1:22:52

day at Dublin. And I

1:22:54

quickly gathered that all the substitutes

1:22:56

from Old Trafford will be starting in Dublin. But

1:22:59

that didn't appease fans. I didn't understand why

1:23:01

people had paid a lot of money for their tickets at

1:23:03

the Aviva. The game had sold out quickly.

1:23:06

And after that had happened, United

1:23:08

announced another friendly,

1:23:10

Old Trafford. So a lot

1:23:12

of people were on my case on social media

1:23:15

to the point that I was going to tweet out and say, look,

1:23:18

I don't pick the team. I'm

1:23:20

with you. I hear what you're saying.

1:23:22

And then stood on Lansdowne

1:23:24

Road, absolutely hammered it down.

1:23:27

So if you want another similarity with

1:23:29

Northern England, it was raining, then it was

1:23:31

sunny. We saw that of

1:23:33

United Re-Stand in no time. Brilliant

1:23:36

to meet Manchester United fans

1:23:38

in real life. So you brought over the fans

1:23:40

in Everton?

1:23:43

Yeah. And I was worried. I was worried on two

1:23:45

levels. One, people

1:23:47

told me that Irish people don't carry cash anymore.

1:23:50

And our card readers don't work in

1:23:52

Republic of Ireland.

1:23:54

And two, we're allowed to sell

1:23:56

anywhere as a printed publication. I'm

1:24:00

told that you need special street traders licenses.

1:24:03

No, no, don't mind that's be grand. So

1:24:06

I was worried. So we brought

1:24:08

copies over and the

1:24:11

police, the police were fine with us and

1:24:13

we sold them in no time. We could have sold four

1:24:15

times as many as we brought.

1:24:18

And I really enjoyed it.

1:24:20

So much interaction goes on online.

1:24:23

So to stand on the street and have people coming up to

1:24:25

you, one man came up to me with a copy

1:24:27

of issue three from February, 1990. Oh,

1:24:30

how wonderful was that? It was just just

1:24:32

brilliant.

1:24:33

And Dale,

1:24:34

a United fan from Clonemouth,

1:24:36

he came up and helped us sell. So

1:24:39

that was good. But you know, 90% of people

1:24:41

were saying I was disappointed. They were

1:24:43

with with the expected lineup.

1:24:46

And I think they're entitled

1:24:48

to have that opinion. But the Aviva

1:24:51

is a top stadium. And

1:24:54

I was actually going to fly back to Bilbao with the with

1:24:56

the athletic Bilbao team. That had all been arranged and

1:24:58

it changed at the last minute. So

1:25:00

the

1:25:02

vast majority crowd were Manchester United fans.

1:25:05

I saw the headlines about Harry Maguire being

1:25:07

booed. I sat in the West and

1:25:09

I wasn't in the media. And I

1:25:12

actually thought he got more support than

1:25:14

where I was.

1:25:16

And

1:25:17

the game, it wasn't the best game ever. I had

1:25:19

an exciting finish. It's

1:25:22

not for me to say whether it was it was good

1:25:24

value or not for the people who were there.

1:25:26

But it illustrates

1:25:27

just how popular Manchester United are

1:25:29

in Dublin and the Republic

1:25:32

of Ireland to sell that big stadium out so quickly.

1:25:35

And when I was looking at that stadium and it happened before,

1:25:37

I'm

1:25:38

going to see the stadiums on the US tour

1:25:40

and thinking,

1:25:42

all traffered, I really love it. But you

1:25:44

know, there's no leg room in comparison to here.

1:25:47

The architecture is not as good as here.

1:25:50

So I've absorbed absorbing

1:25:52

information on all different levels. Ten

1:25:55

hard came. He brought his team.

1:25:58

Athletic club rules.

1:25:59

going to be technically good as well.

1:26:02

Look, it wasn't the best game ever, but I

1:26:04

still came away from it. Touched by the enthusiasm

1:26:07

and the passion

1:26:08

of Manchester United fans. I came across that.

1:26:10

What age are you, Mandy? What

1:26:13

age are you now? 49. 49. So

1:26:15

Dan and I are, shall we

1:26:17

say, the other side of we're in our 40s now. We're actually

1:26:20

all in our 40s. We're for the

1:26:22

level of Premier League, like

1:26:24

saturation when I was a kid is phenomenal.

1:26:28

This is still a thing where Manchester United

1:26:30

can sell out that quickly. Manchester

1:26:32

United was,

1:26:34

when I was a kid, was like

1:26:36

Eric Antonin was possibly almost like, and

1:26:38

Roy Keane. These are the biggest personalities in sports

1:26:41

when I was a kid. It still exists,

1:26:43

Dan. Man United is

1:26:47

still a massive, massive thing. No, it is. Listen,

1:26:50

we spoke about poor Andy. Come on, let's not have the same

1:26:53

discussion again. I think just

1:26:55

the disappointment for the fans of the weekend was even I

1:26:57

think the game in Old Trafford on Saturday was priced

1:26:59

in a very different way. They made a big deal of

1:27:01

it. And as I said, I

1:27:03

mentioned I knew people who

1:27:04

actually flew over to that and it worked out

1:27:07

better. But it still doesn't matter. I

1:27:09

think if there was another game announced in Dublin in the morning,

1:27:12

it would still sell out, even

1:27:14

if some people might be a little bit

1:27:17

more guarded, maybe

1:27:19

wanting to know a little bit more about who might possibly

1:27:21

play. But there's no denying that great love,

1:27:23

like the great love that exists. I just

1:27:25

think, I would have said some of the fans travelling

1:27:28

from outside of Dublin would nearly be better putting

1:27:32

that money towards the trip to Manchester

1:27:34

in the future, unless there's guarantees

1:27:36

around these games. But look, you can't tell people,

1:27:38

maybe loads of people that were there despite that

1:27:40

still had a very good time, even if they were very

1:27:43

disappointed travelling up. But I suppose the bigger

1:27:45

picture, Andy, is a week out from the season,

1:27:47

how is the fan base feeling generally

1:27:50

about where things are headed?

1:27:53

attention

1:28:00

has switched more to possible

1:28:02

probable outgoings now. Manchester

1:28:05

United need money and

1:28:07

spent a lot on the three players who've signed so

1:28:09

far.

1:28:11

Wolves at home,

1:28:12

Manchester United really should be winning

1:28:14

that game. The season starts slowly. It's

1:28:17

a game per week as opposed to two per week which

1:28:19

we saw

1:28:21

pretty much from after the World Cup finished.

1:28:23

So it's a game of Wolves, it's a game

1:28:25

against Forest, it's against Tottenham.

1:28:28

I spoke to lots

1:28:30

of people on the tour, spoke to lots of players and

1:28:33

they are confident, genuinely confident. I'm

1:28:35

sure they would have said they were confident a year ago and

1:28:38

then they lost the opening two games against Brighton

1:28:40

and Bramford but

1:28:41

I believe that the team is better than a

1:28:44

year ago. All sorts of questions.

1:28:46

Rasmus Huyland, how is

1:28:48

he going to do? Who's

1:28:49

going to start as Mason Mount didn't

1:28:51

have enough to start? Who's going to be the right

1:28:54

back out of

1:28:55

Aaron Wambasaka

1:28:57

and Diogo Delott? I

1:28:59

don't think those questions have been

1:29:01

decided yet by the manager but I

1:29:04

think Manchester United are in pretty good shape

1:29:07

and Wolves at home should be

1:29:09

a good start to the season for the

1:29:11

team. What would constitute a good season

1:29:13

this year?

1:29:16

Good question and I'm just sort of formulating

1:29:18

my answer to that but I have been thinking about

1:29:20

it a lot and I'm going to say

1:29:23

more points than last year in the league,

1:29:25

more goals, another

1:29:27

cup and a decent

1:29:30

run in the Champions League but

1:29:32

with a fair wind,

1:29:34

you never know. I also

1:29:36

think that

1:29:37

rivals are going to be stronger. I think Liverpool

1:29:39

won't be as bad as last season,

1:29:41

I believe, will Chelsea. I thought they'd look

1:29:44

like they've got

1:29:45

a good attack-minded manager.

1:29:48

Manchester City will clearly be favourites

1:29:51

once again so.

1:29:53

Ten Heart made all-traff in the fortress last

1:29:55

year. Manchester United have got to improve

1:29:57

away from home against the good team.

1:29:59

and I spoke to several players

1:30:02

about that and they know that that's

1:30:04

the one area where

1:30:05

United have got to be more consistent within matches

1:30:08

and

1:30:09

Let's see if that happens. There's a game against Tottenham

1:30:11

coming up Although actually Tottenham were the

1:30:13

only team in the top nine who didn't beat

1:30:15

Manchester United at home last season

1:30:18

because you know It's Tottenham

1:30:20

Or are Tottenham any different this season your perspective

1:30:22

the cane thing is kind of rumbling on looks like he's gonna say

1:30:25

no Yeah,

1:30:27

it does you know he was Eric tenor's

1:30:29

first choice target towards the end

1:30:32

of the season but United

1:30:35

looked at the probable

1:30:36

wage cost of Hurricane as

1:30:38

well as a transfer fee as well

1:30:40

as what they thought would be Tottenham's reluctance

1:30:43

to sell to a rival and just Thought

1:30:45

we do not want a whole summer Chasing

1:30:48

a player like we did with Frankie

1:30:50

de Jong a year ago. So United

1:30:52

looked at

1:30:53

Rasmus Huyland there wasn't

1:30:57

a huge number of strikers to go for

1:31:00

And also switched attention to Andrea Nana one

1:31:02

of the four goalkeepers Manchester United were

1:31:05

were looking at

1:31:06

but he was the first choice And and he came

1:31:08

in

1:31:09

told he's making a good impression Although he

1:31:11

was loved at the weekend against lungs

1:31:13

get your mistakes out of the way

1:31:15

early so It's

1:31:18

a big important season, but tenor

1:31:21

genuinely has the support of the fans

1:31:23

and of the players and I spoke to enough

1:31:26

of them to know that

1:31:27

That is the case but

1:31:30

he's gonna be judged by results and performances

1:31:32

combined 60 million West Ham bid

1:31:34

from acquire Mactomini is quite interesting

1:31:38

It's very interesting It's starting to look like a serious

1:31:41

bid isn't it when when I saw a bit of 20 million

1:31:43

I thought there's no way Manchester United are gonna sell

1:31:45

for that a play root cost so much but

1:31:48

when you start going 50 60 and

1:31:50

You look at it from the players perspective

1:31:53

they will be thinking am I gonna play and

1:31:56

the answer is probably not

1:31:58

Unless there's gonna be injuries, but not just

1:34:01

Money triumphs every single

1:34:03

time and always has

1:34:05

done and was pretty uncharacteristic

1:34:08

of Rafa Verand to come out and say that I think

1:34:10

he's right in saying that

1:34:12

and maybe he knows his own body better

1:34:14

than most players and he knows he can't be

1:34:16

playing

1:34:17

two games a week he's someone who's picked up a lot of injuries

1:34:19

but there will be more and more demands

1:34:22

put on players because money will

1:34:24

see out and the pushback from clubs or

1:34:26

authorities well you're getting paid

1:34:29

a huge amount of money but I'm with the players

1:34:32

on this one

1:34:33

and we saw at the weekend in the championship

1:34:36

in England games were lasting 22

1:34:38

minutes longer we saw it

1:34:40

in the World Cup final I'm not sure it was like in

1:34:43

Ireland I was going to go to Shamrock Rovers on Sunday

1:34:45

but it was just a bit too close to the finish

1:34:47

of the game of the Aviva

1:34:49

but I will be back to see them. You're

1:34:51

an absolute agent Andy, like because yeah it

1:34:53

would have been an hour definitely that was the kickoff

1:34:56

time four to six years ago yeah seven

1:34:58

would have been okay. We need to catch the

1:35:00

Friday night game because that's when like the Sunday

1:35:02

games are they just don't have quite the same

1:35:05

but you I guarantee you you

1:35:07

will love a league of Ireland game.

1:35:09

I've heard all about them I

1:35:11

know and respect the rivalries and touching

1:35:14

on what you said earlier when Man United used to

1:35:16

come over in the 90s I saw them play

1:35:18

at places like Shelborne

1:35:20

although I was told that it's shells and anyone

1:35:22

who says Shelborne is posh I

1:35:24

was corrected at the weekend on that

1:35:26

one so now I know about the rivalry

1:35:28

St Patrick's, Bohemians and

1:35:31

I know that there's a very rich football culture there and

1:35:34

I see some shots of the atmosphere and I

1:35:36

really respect it you know I know English

1:35:38

football is really well supported in the Republic of

1:35:40

Ireland but I think it's also important that the domestic

1:35:43

league does

1:35:44

well and I keep an eye on it you know Cork

1:35:46

City I saw Dundalk a few years ago I know

1:35:48

there's been some pretty compelling stories there. Yeah

1:35:50

Dan actually brought his mother for

1:35:53

her 80th birthday to the Shelborne

1:35:55

hotel which is this posh

1:35:57

shop in town when it's

1:35:59

my

1:35:59

mother's turn she either be going to watch Shelburne

1:36:02

or she'll be going to watch the dogs in Shelburne

1:36:04

Park. First, after, sorry,

1:36:06

philosophy of the trade authority, thanks Andy.

1:36:08

A bit like the dogs I've

1:36:11

had. So let's hear from Korkomogie

1:36:13

boss Mathieu Toomey on the Royal Ireland Triumph.

1:36:15

After that we have Tim Clancy in studio.

1:36:19

Yeah that was Mathieu Toomey, little

1:36:21

known fact Tim Clancy's actually a very good holder or

1:36:23

at least you play it a bit anyway. I wouldn't say very

1:36:25

good Johnny. A defensive

1:36:27

corner forward would be my position. Where'd

1:36:31

you play? Is this an app boy? Is it? Killtale,

1:36:34

down there just outside Trem there. You

1:36:37

were playing when you were a drawed a mentor weren't you? You were like

1:36:39

doing bits in the summer in that.

1:36:42

Rocking up for whatever they're stuck. The juniors

1:36:44

now,

1:36:45

no one here to see. So it's interesting because

1:36:47

we're speaking to Sarah about like trying to get Korkomogie

1:36:50

sold. You kids as well, like so

1:36:52

in your part

1:36:54

of the world what are they likely to, I know one

1:36:56

of your daughters has gotten into horse and that, but what are they likely

1:36:58

to be introduced

1:37:00

locally I suppose? In Meade?

1:37:03

Listen I think Trim's got unbelievable

1:37:06

facilities in the GEA Club. I think

1:37:08

it's one of the best in the country for a club team. It's

1:37:11

remarkable setup they have up there and they're

1:37:14

strong obviously GEA connections in Meade

1:37:17

and Killtale where we were living for

1:37:19

five years there when the kids go to school is just

1:37:21

all Herlin and Komogie.

1:37:23

There's no way of footballing in that little village. So

1:37:25

I think you play freighter than Saini or

1:37:27

an Alvi in the football if you're

1:37:30

from Killtale. So that area I

1:37:32

think they had a few there in the intermediate all-iron

1:37:35

final there on Sunday as well from the

1:37:37

club as well. So yeah

1:37:39

there's just a good chance you'd end up if you're

1:37:42

definitely from Killtale you're definitely playing Herlin or Komogie. See

1:37:45

you're a kid right, facilities got a matter right

1:37:47

so on. I was actually delighted

1:37:49

with the Icelandic lads who went to Oria last

1:37:51

week and said what did they call it like they don't.

1:37:54

Pigsty. Pigsty and they're like the

1:37:56

pitch is a disgrace they were saying

1:37:58

and you're looking at like

1:37:59

the blick or like turning ice and whatever

1:38:02

and shadow clothes go over there I wasn't there but by all

1:38:04

accounts really really modern facilities sports

1:38:06

kind of facilities and I don't

1:38:09

know Tim in this country we're so far

1:38:11

behind not only in football but so

1:38:13

many sports you know like we've so much money in this

1:38:15

country we can't seem to get our facilities right

1:38:17

no I think even if you look at there's a huge

1:38:20

project for Park Dalton

1:38:22

and me then a lot of the clubs

1:38:24

as well would be probably the same having

1:38:26

been touched football or GEA in

1:38:29

the last maybe 15, 20,

1:38:30

30 years even I

1:38:33

think the league of Ireland we've banged that drum

1:38:35

enough now that the facilities are the main

1:38:37

thing that we have to try and improve and

1:38:40

facilities are training facilities all

1:38:44

facilities and I know management

1:38:47

will prioritize training facilities

1:38:49

and also others will probably higher

1:38:52

up will prioritize this stadium but

1:38:54

I think as soon as both improve

1:38:57

massively and that's only going to help with

1:38:59

government funding you'll see

1:39:01

probably a better product for

1:39:04

a very very personal question before Dan gets

1:39:06

in what football have you been watching

1:39:08

since you left the role in integer

1:39:10

have you been watching? Yeah

1:39:13

no watch the game most weekends

1:39:15

I love the

1:39:16

LOI TV on if I don't go I've been to drop

1:39:19

a few times to both against

1:39:21

Rovers and bit of a bandwagon

1:39:24

jumping like yourself there Johnny only big games ago to work.

1:39:27

True yeah that's a bit harsh than Johnny does

1:39:29

but he doesn't go to games at all. But

1:39:31

like the Irish players

1:39:33

now like the likes of you know you're looking at the Southampton

1:39:35

situation and like when you start engrossing

1:39:38

yourself now on all the kind of the English and Scottish

1:39:40

games as well with this massive Irish interest

1:39:42

well particularly a championship level I suppose.

1:39:45

I think last weekend you've seen probably a

1:39:47

good bulk of our players getting the first game of the season

1:39:49

in the championship and SPL or

1:39:51

whatever else so yeah taking

1:39:54

a good few games ones around Italian ones

1:39:56

you can get access to so I watched

1:39:58

a

1:39:59

bit of the game. Cardiff and Leeds game

1:40:01

and Callum O'Dowd was doing really well at left

1:40:03

back and forcing to let

1:40:06

in a few leg goals or whatever the leg goal that caused

1:40:08

them the point but yeah it's good that

1:40:10

actually football's back and you can see that and

1:40:14

they will say football in the UK's back you can see that

1:40:17

the ball's about to play us again and a lot of the Irish

1:40:19

players are getting going again now. Because I know I was

1:40:21

chatting to you briefly last week about

1:40:24

Chilozi Agbene who you played against who's

1:40:26

gone to play Premier League football this

1:40:28

year and I know you would have worked with Luke McNally if

1:40:31

Johnny likes to bring up in this show maybe every 30 minutes

1:40:33

or so

1:40:35

but he's gone on loan now to Stoke and

1:40:37

I just wonder like from your experience of

1:40:40

like spending a lot of your career in the UK as a

1:40:42

player and then seeing players here

1:40:45

and knowing what it takes that like I think

1:40:47

it's funny I think there's a correlation you always

1:40:49

spoke with Luke about how athletically

1:40:51

he's very good. Agbene you spoke about playing

1:40:53

against him when he was what 18-19 and

1:40:56

you could see his athleticism is

1:40:58

that almost the number one thing we're looking

1:41:00

at with some of our Irish players now in terms

1:41:02

of making that transition to the UK and and

1:41:04

seeing the ones that you know

1:41:06

can hopefully make it over there. I

1:41:08

think that's where football's

1:41:10

going yeah I think if you if I spoke to Owen Doyle

1:41:12

about it quite a bit as well and Doyle was

1:41:15

flying the SPL and flying in league

1:41:17

one and league two level and then when he stepped up the championship

1:41:19

he said it's just a little bit different where they're

1:41:21

all physically very very good and

1:41:24

I'd say it probably is the first thing that someone asks you

1:41:26

as soon as it what's this player like

1:41:29

and then next question would be how big is

1:41:31

he? Athletic quick and it sort

1:41:33

of goes down that route and then I think to be

1:41:36

playing at that level and not be athletic you have to be absolutely

1:41:39

phenomenal and I think

1:41:41

the ones like

1:41:42

Agbene who's left, who's at

1:41:44

Cork obviously he's a young lad and went to Limerick to get

1:41:46

game time and I played against him he

1:41:49

was athletically very very good and

1:41:51

he's kept on again.

1:41:53

Yeah that's smart when you think about it. When he was at Limerick

1:41:56

when I was at Parade last season I was there so and then

1:41:59

you'll see the likes of

1:41:59

Luke and young lads like that

1:42:02

as well and I think that's why I spoke

1:42:04

so very highly of Adam Murphy as well. I was just going

1:42:07

to say, yeah, people will ask you

1:42:09

because as some parts boss you worked with

1:42:11

Adam Murphy with Sam Curtis, even with

1:42:13

Mason Melia sort of laterally who

1:42:15