Joe Brolly: My mother’s curse

MY mother was very annoyed when Paudie Clifford chatted his way through the national anthem.

She is a religious woman who keeps large bottles of holy water inside the front door to throw over visitors’ cars when they are leaving.

As my brother Proinsias says, “you need to wind the windows up quickly.”

“I hope they get bate,” she said, angrily putting the curse on Paudie and Kerry.

After that, the result was a formality.

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The game started in a bluster of Kerry anger. An illegal scrum at midfield was followed by an illegal scrum on the Donegal goal line.

“Kerry are really up for this one,” said Mike Finnerty.

Anger, as Jim Gavin says, is an unhelpful emotion in sport. It destroys concentration and composure.

Kerry were so up for this one that after three minutes they were 1-2 to 0-0 down. When they won four Donegal kick outs in a row midway through the first period, the gap came down to two but that was as good as it got.

The modern game is for plotters. Jimmy is the superior plotter. Jack O’Connor is out of his depth and his team appears to know that.

The loose ends from last year’s All-Ireland final having been tied up. Not marking Paudie. A predictable kick out strategy. Not doubling up on David and constantly allowing him to come inside.

This was another humiliation for Kerry. By half-time, Donegal were five up. Then, there was the tale of two uppercuts. Kerry have been enraged that Michael Murphy got away with his.

Sadly, for them, Micheál Burns did not get away with his, leaving Ryan McHugh with a bloodied face. Jimmy thought it was Diarmuid O’Connor who had done it and flounced about the field roaring and waving his arms like a spoiled teenage girl, pointing and shouting at Diarmuid.

But the camera tells no lies. This time, an official spotted the punch and Burns was sent off. Sean Hurson will breathe a sigh of relief.

Since David Gough’s officials missed the Murphy uppercut, Gough has been sent to Connacht, recently appearing as linesman for a Carlow match. It is only a matter of time before David is appointed to referee an underage blitz in Leitrim, with B&B not included.

After the sending off, Donegal’s masterclass in efficiency continued uninterrupted. If Kerry stood off, Donegal expertly held possession. If they pushed up, they wove their way through them for scores.

When I was playing, getting a man sent off was no big deal, the general wisdom being that it could energise the opposition.

We played an Ulster semi-final once against Tyrone, they had two men sent off and won. In the 1983 final, Dublin famously had three sent off and still beat Galway.

Those chaotic, emotional days are no more. Now, it is the calm appliance of science.

Clifford replaced

Finnbarr Roarty savaged Paudie who was taken off. David barely got the ball. By the 50th minute Donegal were seven up and the Kerry ones were leaving.

Mike Finnerty asked Michael Meehan: “what do Kerry need to do here?”

Michael said: “they need to do something”. It was about all he could say. It only got worse, the lead stretching out to 13 by the 63rd minute.

It is a strange phenomenon that Donegal have always been treated as though they were one of the six counties.

By this, I mean that when they are winning big, it is virtually an affront to the sacred traditions of the game.

The commentary team opened the box of excuses and ran through them.

“It’s very hard to read anything into this Donegal win,” said Meehan.

“It was all down to that red card,” said Paddy Andrews.

“To be fair, when your free taker (Sean O’Shea) is missing it’s a hard blow to cope with.”

Never mind that Kerry only got three frees in the entire game.

“Winning an All-Ireland can take it out of you psychologically.”

Just imagine for a moment that the scoreline was reversed. They would have been gushing about a new golden era for Kerry football and all that sugary guff.

The truth is that Donegal took the piss out of Kerry, again. Kerry quit, again. Donegal controlled the game from start to finish. It was so embarrassing that Jimmy brought on a sub to make his debut.

As for the commentary team? When David Clifford scored a two pointer with three minutes to go, leaving Kerry a mere 11 points behind, Mike said, “great score by David Clifford, showing typical courage.”

Give me a break. Kerry lost the league final by 13. Here, it was only 10. If they keep going in this direction, they could narrow it to six or seven come July.