A player from the midlands who combines some of the most ostentatious bits of Ronaldinho and Jonny Wilkinson, and the latest in the Seanie Johnston v Cavan saga. All in today’s Hospital Pass.
Well we have to admit we were taken a bit by surprise when we saw the top scorers in the Gaelic football championship totted up.
Wexford’s Ben Brosnan went close to landing the honours last year and another sharpshooter from a lesser Leinster county appears to be in the running this time around.
Longford’s Sean McCormack is currently the top scorer in the Championship, his 11-point haul against dire Derry at the weekend catapulting him three points clear of Meath’s Brian Farrell at the top of the standings.
Whereas Brosnan might be something akin to Gaelic football’s equivalent of Cristiano Ronaldo – fancy hair, fancy boots and shoot-on-sight-even-if-the-ball-goes-out-of-the-ground policy – McCormack straddles loads of different sports stars with his free-kick routine alone.
A bit of Ronaldinho-style ball-juggling to start with, and then a silly arse-out-and-hands-together stance reminiscent of Jonny Wilkinson in his pomp.
Both of those quirks are generally followed by the ball sailing between the posts, so it’s all good from Longford’s point of view. We’ll be keeping a close eye on this as the summer progresses so we’ll be shouting for Longford against Limerick in the qualifiers second round next week.
If only to allow ourselves a bit of a snicker when the routine hits the skids in a higher pressure encounter later in the summer.
Seanie v Cavan v the Munster hurling final
If you want to see Seanie Johnston v Cavan in a couple of weeks’ time it seems you’re going to have to head along to Breffni Park on the day.
The dates, times and venues – which in GAA-speak go together like a horse and carriage these days – for the second round of the All-Ireland football qualifiers were announced today.
The eight games are split over Saturday and Sunday (July 14-15) with the fine sight of 15 Cavan men in blue going bald-headed for one Cavan man in white due to take place on Sunday afternoon at 3pm.
That means the Seanie lynch-mob will not be screened live on television, as the big games on the day are Sligo-Mayo in the Connacht football final and Waterford-Tipp in the Munster hurling decider.
It’s an unfortunate bit of scheduling, because there’s a chunk of football supporters all over the country who – mindful of the fact that Tipp dished out a seven-goal hiding to Waterford a year ago – might have been very interested in tuning into events from Breffni.
However, given that Cavan are not exactly up to a whole lot (their qualifier win over Fermanagh last weekend was tantamount to two Ulster eunuchs fighting over a condom) and that Kildare’s five-year dalliance with Kieran McGeeney has atoned for its greatly increased bravado with a rather incontestable lack of medals, maybe not getting to see this one could be best for all of us.
