The more things change in the GAA, the more they stay the same. Actually, scratch that, change is a very confusing phenomenon in the GAA. Last year, Galway, Tipp, Kilkenny and Waterford contested the All-Ireland hurling semifinals. This year, Galway, Tipp, Kilkenny and Waterford contested the All-Ireland hurling semifinals. In football this year, Kerry, Dublin and Mayo make up three of the four All-Ireland semifinalists just as they did in 2013, 2014 and 2015.
Perhaps, at the elite end of the intercounty game, change is not something that can be conventionally measured. Perhaps change is instead measured in the subtle transformations that mark out the identity of teams, transformations that can be difficult for fans and media to discern by sitting through a seventy minute game of football or hurling.
Consider the journeys that the Mayo footballers and Galway hurlers embarked on over the last season. Both found themselves tantalisingly close to the pinnacle at the end of the 2015 season. Both counties have found themselves in that desolate place many times over the years. Galway have lost six All-Ireland's in the last 25 years. Mayo have lost seven in 28 years. There is no culture of success in either place.
So, late last year, the players of both counties both took the difficult and unpopular decision to force out their respective managers. In both cases, the process was drawn-out and public and unseemly. While their rivals were plotting for the coming season, both counties were burdened by self-inflicted housekeeping. There must have been internal dissent and doubt.
I actually feel sorry for anthony cunningham. His statement shows how hurt he is.. #hurling #Galway
— Niamh Thornbury (wear a mask) (@niamharmagh11) November 16, 2015
Round of applause & standing ovation as Holmes and Connelly resign at Mayo managers pic.twitter.com/n2U0HcCwor
— Pat McGrath (@patmcgrath) October 2, 2015
As we reach the business end of the 2016 season, we can begin to assess what Galway and Mayo gained from sacking their managers. The results tells one story. The journey tells another.
Firstly, those muddled results. Mayo have reached an All-Ireland final again as they did in 2013, when their path to September involved neither Munster or Leinster at the semifinal stage. But they lost in Connacht, which hadn't happened since 2010, and they nearly lost to Fermanagh, but the qualifier draw put them back on course. What Connelly and Holmes would have done for this route to September.
As for Galway, well, their season is clearly worse than last season's. They beat Tipp by one point in the semifinal stage in 2015 and lost to them by a point in 2016. They lost another Leinster final to Kilkenny. They were relegated in the league.
I'd imagine Pat Holmes and Noel Connelly prob derived a little satisfaction from that result despite what they might say #mayo #playerpower
— Roy Malone (@roymalone100) June 18, 2016
Galway players can't blame Anthony Cunningham this year, #TIPPvGAL
— Cathal Foley (@cathal_foley) August 14, 2016
But again, the results only can tell us so much. For the groups of players - especially the older guard in each team - 2016 can only be seen as a success. As the people who invest their entire lives into their sport for limited personal gain, these players retain final say on who is the best person to guide them.
Turfing out Cunningham and Connelly/Holmes brought an unnecessary and visible pressure in counties already edgy and starved of success. But despite midsummer stumbles, both counties answered their critics this summer. Mayo could have wilted against Fermanagh. They would have been excused if they buckled against Tyrone, arguably the second best team in the country this year.
Newspaper columnists were calling for in-season rebuilding from Micheal O'Donoghue after the Leinster final defeat. By and large, O'Donoghue stuck with his guns and Galway beat Clare despite being pilloried by all and sunder before the game. When Joe Canning went off at halftime against Tipp, Galway did not crumble, at least not at first. They tapped into a well of character, the kind of thing acquired from experience and trust gained as a collective.
Both teams added to their challenges by forcing their manager out. But both teams have gained a toughness from it.
The odds are against Mayo next month. Come October, the players could easily decide that Stephen Rochford is not the man for the job. Galway might say the same about O'Donoghue. But this is the nature of the game these men play. Barring a few notable exceptions, managers come and go. In 10 or 20 years time, the gifted players from both counties - O'Shea, Canning et al - will look back and ask themselves did they do everything they could have to reach that pinnacle.
Maybe the results will say they weren't good enough, as athletes, as men. But better to fall short honestly than die wondering.
