McSherry’s Musings – Delete the ‘mark’

Last Sunday, I called with the Mammy to watch the All-Ireland football final. She still reads my column although advised me, she swipes left on seeing the word ‘football’. However, this needs to be written for her as much as anyone.

During an entertaining game, boy wonder David Clifford caught the ball, raised his arm in the air, the defenders backed off him and he kicked it over the lath. Giving me ‘that’ look, she asked, “Why did he get a freekick?”

I replied, “It’s a long story Mum, involving so much safety-first possession football that led the powers-that-be to offer a free kick if a forward caught the ball from a long kicked pass. It’s called the ‘mark’”.

She raised her eyes to the Heavens. “It’s not my fault,” I pleaded.

The cure was worse than the disease. Clifford, who is well capable of playing on and producing magic, now sheepishly raises his arm in the air like a child in a primary school class, before tapping over a point. We are being robbed of great moments. It is akin to a host at a party cutting the icing off a cake and throwing it in the bin, before serving a slice.

I debated with a young fan last week and he said, “Ach, isn’t it great to see Clifford catch it!” A ‘do rightly’ attitude.

Bomber Liston was a full forward colossus waay back in the Kerry ‘golden years’. There is YouTube footage of him rising into the sky in the 1978 All-Ireland final against Dublin, turning, hand-passing a one-two to beat his marker before booming the ball to the net and running off with his arms in the air as the indomitable Micheal O’Hehir describes the action. These days players have the option of going on Bomber-like, but all too often don’t survey the land and the programmed arm goes up automatically as they think, “That’s a point”. For goodness sake, Michael Murphy, one of the best footballers of this generation, now catches the ball in the basket, his back to goal with the nearest opponent a yard off, and raises his hand. Back in the day he… you know the rest.

We loved Frank McGuigan from the Loughshore. He was a God before there was ‘God’. In 1982 he returned from the US and we wondered was the genius still there.

I stood in the Marshes with my Dad and young Roger as Down supporters jeered our number 14. At half-time my father suggested he was on a different wavelength to his team-mates who didn’t really get what visioned pass he would send next.

With minutes to go, the game was level and a high ball landed in on top of All Star Paddy Kennedy.

But Frank soared into the air, grabbed the leather and on landing chipped it over the keeper from about 20 yards. I’m going to cry. What a memory! The King was back, long live the King! These days, it is likely we would have been deprived of such a moment for a mark that would be long since forgotten. That wonderful quotation from Hamlet seems apt, ‘To be or not to be that’.

When the Ardboe man threw a dummy, the crowd paid to get back into the ground. On a famous day in July ‘84, he threw Armagh men all over Clones scoring 11 points from play off his right foot, left foot and one with his fist. It was jaw dropping, a performance still revered.

I was on the grass bank as the banner proclaimed, ‘In Clones they call McGuigan the Cyclone, in Tyrone we call him the King’.

Frank was celebrated in song and verse… ‘all of us remember that great day when you returned to get 11 points from play…’

I viewed that performance last week and counted at least four points that would be called as marks these days… zzz. It’s been suggested McGuigan would laugh at the ‘mark’ rule. He certainly didn’t need it.

As the great back Tomás Ó Sé tweeted, “An absolute farce of a rule. Bin it and never discuss it again. Giving a free for catching a ball? And taking away the chance the defender has of defending it. I hate it”. Ditto Tomás.

The most famous goal ever scored in an All-Ireland final was 40 years ago when Seamus Darby gloriously ended Kerry’s bid for a five-in-a row.

Darby caught the ball, spun and kicked it over the despairing dive of Charlie Nelligan.

I was there on the Hill behind that goal. Incredible!

It was as if the stadium rose!

It spawned a brilliant book ‘Kings of September’ by Michael Foley.

That game and Seamus Darby’s name is etched in the annals of the GAA forever.

When Darby caught that ball, Offaly were two points behind and there was time for another kick-out and another play. Thank God there was no ‘mark’ those days!

Would Mulligan have called for a ‘mark’ when he caught the ball in ‘05 rather than tee up the Teacher for that great goal?

Peter Canavan, not the height of two turf, didn’t need a ‘mark’ to score points! Neither does David Clifford.

The debate on whether he will be the greatest player ever, is defunct until the ‘mark’ is erased.

We don’t know what fantastic plays and stories we are losing.