It's the eternal conundrum that most captains or individuals face - do you jinx yourself and prepare a winner's speech, or do you not get your hopes up and hope that you think of something in the moment.
It's a situation that Tipperary captain Brendan Maher faced yesterday, and after he said that he is annoyed that he forgot to thank Michael Ryan and the rest of the Tipperary management - you'd think that he hadn't one ready.
Brendan Maher lifts Liam https://t.co/xSiFnJFTYK
— The Sunday Game (@TheSundayGame) September 4, 2016
Maher said that it was such a rush of jubliation and excitement that he didn't really know what to think:
It’s unbelievable, the stuff you dream of. In the moment you don’t know what to think, you’re all over the place, and I forgot to mention Mick Ryan and the management in the speech. I had him first on the list. I saw the names and said I’d come back to it but I just forgot. You don’t know what you’re at!
Except that he had a speech ready. A couple of days after beating Galway, Maher scribbled his notes down to get them out of his head so he could focus on the game:
I scribbled a few notes out the day after the Galway game. Got it out of the head.
I was sitting down in my home house, doing a bit of work, and it came into my head. I saw there was a copy and a biro on the table so I just said, ‘right, I’ll jot down a few thank yous’ and it was out of my head then.
Maher said he did it so that it wouldn't occupy his thoughts in the build-up to the final. The way he played you could tell it worked. It was something that he learned from in 2014, when he didn't have anything ready, and that after consulting former Tipperary captain Eoin Kelly thought it was the best thing to do:
I probably learned that from the last time in 2014 and I had spoken to Eoin (Kelly) about it as well and he said he didn’t do it in 2011 and it corrupted his thoughts in the lead-up to it.
That’s natural no matter how focused you are coming in to it, that’s still going to come into your head. I didn’t have to think about it because I had it written down, but I’d be like that - I like to write things down.
A lesson for the superstitious amongst us.
See Also: Listen: Marty Morrissey Drew A Few Tears With His Pre-Match Commentary
Photo by Stephen McCarthy/Sportsfile
