Davy Fitz’s run-in with some of his former Waterford players has been the talk of the GAA all week and last night John Mullane revealed the reasons behind his elaborate celebrations on Sunday.
Following Waterford’s narrow victory over Clare in a magnificent encounter at Semple Stadium on Sunday, Mullane celebrated wildly in front of former Déise boss Davy Fitz, who it was later revealed in a controversial investigation on The Sunday Game, had a run-in with another Waterford player while patrolling the sideline during the game.
There had been speculation as to the reasons why Mullane had celebrated so provocatively in front of his former mentor and the man himself revealed the reasons while appearing as a guest on RTE’s Championship Matters last night.
The Déise forward confirmed that Fitzgerald had passed “comments” about him in the run-up to the game on Sunday and that they provided ample motivation for him to prove Fitzgerald wrong against Clare.
“We’ll sit down some day and we’ll have it out. We’ll talk it through,” Mullane said.
“We were written off all week but it was overshadowed by the celebrations.”
“I had my reasons for it and Davy is aware of my reasons. Hopefully we can just park it to the side now, move on now and look forward… we’ll have a good look at Cork-Tipperary at the weekend.
“I’m not going to get into it – comments passed to another player’s father. I didn’t take it too kindly.”
Mullane was obviously keen not to delve to deeply into the matter, but pressed by the ever persuasive Marty Morrissey to reveal whether Davy had said that he was “finished”, Mullane elaborated further and confirmed speculation that the row had continued into the Waterford dressing room after the game on Sunday.
“More or less along them lines (that he was finished) – I don’t want to get into the ins and outs of who said what but we had it out in the dressing room after the game and Davy came out and said he didn’t say it. That’s what we’re led to believe (that he did).
“It did drive me on all week… the fact that we were written off by so many people too,” Mullane added.
“I wear my heart on my sleeve. It takes a small thing to set it off for me. I’d like to think I proved a point on Sunday.”
Fitzgerald himself paid tribute to Mullane in an emotional interview after the game on Sunday and although he was probably unaware of Mullane’s comments when putting together his column for the Irish Daily Star today, he expressed his desire to forget about the whole thing.
“At this stage I think everyone has had their say, people have made up their minds and now it’s time to put it to bed and move on,” he wrote.
In the course of the programme, Mullane also stressed that he had enjoyed a good working relationship with Fitzgerald with his time in Waterford, but that his comments, or alleged comments, had been in his head all week.
Both parties seem keen to move on from the matter, but it will certainly be an interesting encounter if the two teams were to run into each other again at a later stage in the championship.
