LAST WEEKEND’S SUNDAY Game saw Martin McHugh give a particularly incendiary soundbite when he labelled Colm Cooper a “two trick pony” (best from the comment section- “What’s his two tricks? Scoring goals and scoring points?”).
McHugh has since rowed back from his comment at a pace that Steve Redgrave would be proud of but his starting point was saying that James O’Donoghue was a better footballer than Cooper.
It got us thinking about other times where pundits have tried to be so clever with a point that they ended up saying something that made people lose their minds. Here are five of our favourites*:
*I’m aware of the absence of a certain RTÉ rugby pundit but there were just too many to choose from, otherwise it would have been an archive rather than a taster*
Stephen Jones – O’Driscoll wouldn’t be in my Lions test team
That point wouldn’t have been as far fetched during the 2013 tour but Jones wrote that during a Sunday Times round table before the the tour of South Africa after Ireland had won the Grand Slam and O’Driscoll had won player of the tournament. O’Driscoll went on to have a cracking tour that culminated in this hit, which was lauded at the time but likely would have got him a ban today.
Didi Hamann- “Yaya Toure is a liability”
Hamann’s point was technically correct — Toure is a liability in a defensive sense. But when you throw that word around about a player who bags 20-plus goals, then people are going to latch onto it rather than the point. And there was a lot of latching, with people mixed on whether Hamann was right.
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Bill O’Herlihy- “David Moyes has seen 39,432 players over a total of five million times.”
I feel a little cruel interrupting Bill’s retirement with a reminder of this, but it was just too brilliant to leave out. Bill always loved to refer to the Guardian to, perhaps, show that he was up to date with some the top football journalists. Unfortunately, he was taken in by a joke stat in one of the columns. In his defence, Moyes had seen Fellaini that many times, yet still thought he was worth £27.5 million.
Joe Brolly- Gooch is a choker
The best thing you can say about Brolly’s column about Colm Cooper is that unlike Martin McHugh, at least Brolly said it in a year where Cooper was actually playing. Brolly said Cooper never played well against Tyrone before saying “An American tourist would never have believed it if you’d told him The Gooch was one of the greats. If however you’d told him he was a choker, he would have agreed, since that is what Colm did against Cross.”
There was a huge backlash against Brolly’s comments and eventually there was a Frost/Nixon showdown between him and Martin Carney on the Sunday Game.
Eamon Dunphy- Bayern Munich are not a top European team
13 March,2013 was a blockbuster day for Dunphy in terms of knee jerking. There was the above comment, made at a time when Bayern was running away with the Bundesliga and on course for a European Cup win. He also said “Brazil have no players you would really covet” and rubbished Arsenal’s young gun “Alex Oxford-Chamberlain”. They are just some of Dunphy’s many lines over his career, and we gathered some of them here to mark his birthday.
This was from a few weeks later after Bayern had actually won the Champions League. What would he have said if they lost?
What are you favourite pundit knee jerks over the years? Surely there are a few that still make your blood boil?
Shameful stuff today from guys who backed themselves into a corner with their “a shag the league it’s all about may 22nd” talk. No touch no pride and no balls. Yet again Kingston is silent post match. I wish tipp well but they beat nothing.
Is it not just a case of cork not having the hurlers
It’s a very worrying time to be a cork fan. We use to be a period dual county challenging for final and hurling honours every year. Now we will be lucky to get one day out in croke park a year. Before we know it we will be like Offaly reliving part glories
Problems stem from county board
Excuse me Offaly are on a winning streak!
County teams thrive when town teams go well. When the town clubs struggle the county struggles… Bar Dublin that’s the fact of the matter that the gaa needs to tackle
Cork reaping what they sow. They neglected underage structures, assuming that they would just find hurlers, like they have always done in the past. Have sorted it out underage now though, won a clean sweep of underage titles last year, u14,u15,u16 so the sleeping giant is waking up, might take 20 years to come through but then watch out.
Kingston read the first half of the book on sweepers. Extra man back, mop up ball ala DeBurca, other defenders just hold off Tipp forwards. But once the sweeper actually got the ball he was clueless. No idea how to utilise the possession up front. No idea how to pick out an out numbered forward. Hitting balls to team mates in the middle of the park, that were in 50/50 positions at best. Painful stuff to watch, Tipp never had to break a sweat and just picked off the easy points
Spot on and it’s destroyed club hurling as well.
Black mark also against Cork juvenile “supporters” for persistant jeering of Tipp freetakers. Where did that example come from?
It was a hard day to hurl with the wind and rain but having watched the game I think Tipp can go a long way this year .
Tipp on a dry day will be better
Shambolic. And I bet .. To add insult to injury Frank Murphy told them that they were only getting ham sandwiches no butter and to make their own way home..
The sweeper system work in that the didn’t concede a goal but my god how brain dead were they using a sweeper for our own puck outs. I would be surprised if we won any of our own puck outs.
I’m sure cork people aren’t interested in the opinions of a Kilkenny man, but here goes. Certain teams ( not just Cork) are applying these new tactics in hurling , sweeper system , flood the break down areas etc…..but it doesn’t get away from the fact the two most successful teams in the last number of years Tipp and KK still stick to the standard positions in Hurling . When Cork were last successful playing more of a running/ short passing game , it was still 15 on 15 , with each player in a battle with his opposite man with the belief that if you won the majority of the battles you won the match … And I think it still stands true today.
If it ain’t broke don’t fix it .
As a Cork man I am more than happy to hear your opinion. In fact I agree with you 100%. We have a suspect defence, and a very good forward line – until new players come into our defence to improve it I would much rather we try outscore teams and leak scores than deprive our forwards and play a muck brand of hurling. Sweeper systems may suit Clare, WFord etc, but I know Cork fans are horrified at the thought of us having it. And as you said, KK and Tipp don’t use them. I just hope we stop using it and start playing our own brand again.
Something seriously wrong with Cork GAS.
With this sweeper abomination hurling is danger of turning into that awful snore fest lacking basic skills that is Gaelic football
Cork GAA.
The rot starts with Murphy, Cork’s President-for-life.
How bloody boring is gaa. Every day on rte news they go through all the boring divisions of minor this and that. Has a disproportionate coverage.
Shock horror biggest sport in the country gets lions share of the coverage. Don’t turn on sky news for fear your head will explode
am i the only one who thinks it was a good idea for Cork to continue with the sweeper. The cork backline needed to be shored up and the more time William Egan gets in that role the better he’ll get, Cork would’ve been destroyed had they not used a sweeper. it’ll take time for this Cork team to fully acclimatise to the sweeper system but they’ll be better for it.
There are an amount of that Cork team not good enough for inter county hurling. Cork will not contest for major honours again for a very long time irrespective of the system they play.
Hurling needs Cork to play the old game and consign this negative ‘sweeper’ system to history. It’s just an admission of inferiority in the traditional skills and when Cork go down that road it’s fair to say that Hurling is in serious trouble.
I’m hoping that the big two, Tipp and Kilkenny beat the daylights out of the ‘sweeper’ counties, who are having great, but boring, games against one another and at least we’ll see some serious Hurling this year.
Same conditions for both teams but in saying that Cork are very poor.
This ‘sweeper’ fad is destroying open hurling.. If you can pick off points and take your frees you’ll win. Goals win games and create excitement. Obviously winning is everything for inter county teams but sacrificing excitement for results is ruining the game for spectators.
The better team will win the majority of the time but the fans want open, exciting and if possible goal fest hurling.. If this trend continues I can see more armchair spectators …
Well done to Tipp senior and intermediate teams. Having witnessed majestic Cork teams down through the years it’s sad to now see a Cork senior hurling team that’s afraid to play hurling.