Derval came close to winning Sport Personality

thirtyfoot

Derval O' Rourke came close to winning the RTE Sports Personality of the Year award. Two of the panel of 6 went for her and four went for Henry Shefflin.

Although I love hurling and Shefflin is a great player, I must admit I was shocked when he won. Only Spillane and Jerry Kiernan went for DOR while Dunphy, Ted Walsh, Cyril Farrell and Hook went for Shefflin. I'm biased towards athletics and other individual international sports, but how Derval, Katie Taylor, Padraig Harrington, Bernard Dunne and Jessica Kuerten finished behind Shefflin baffles me. Does anyone else think RTE's selection process is a bit flawed? What does an international sport person have to do to win?

ZiggyStardust

Hi,
To be honest I was shocked when Shefflin won it. Yes I totally agree it was flawed. I thought they were asking the Panel of so called experts who they thought should win it and discuss, but was shocked to see that it was the actually voting process.
To me (only my opinion) hurling is a game which is played at the highest level by only 6 counties out of 32. I thought it was a disrespect to athletes who comete on the world stage, week in week out. 2 world champions (derval and katie), a showjumper who is number 4 in the world, a golfer who is number 1 in europe, a boxer who is european champion, and a rugby player who was the only northern hemphisphere player nominated for world player of the year.
Maybe they should do it like the BBC and have the public vote. It's just I thought it was a big anti-climax at the end.

Linford

Tingle wrote:

Derval O' Rourke came close to winning the RTE Sports Personality of the Year award. Two of the panel of 6 went for her and four went for Henry Shefflin.

Although I love hurling and Shefflin is a great player, I must admit I was shocked when he won. Only Spillane and Jerry Kiernan went for DOR while Dunphy, Ted Walsh, Cyril Farrell and Hook went for Shefflin. I'm biased towards athletics and other individual international sports, but how Derval, Katie Taylor, Padraig Harrington, Bernard Dunne and Jessica Kuerten finished behind Shefflin baffles me. Does anyone else think RTE's selection process is a bit flawed? What does an international sport person have to do to win?

Surely the sports personality of the year should be someone the majority of the country have heard of! I don't even know who Henry Shefflin is.

Pherekydes

Linford wrote:

Surely the sports personality of the year should be someone the majority of the country have heard of! I don't even know who Henry Shefflin is.

And you are the majority?

Copied from the other thread about this:

I've no doubt Henry Sheflin is a superb hurler, probably the best in the country (world) right now, but what would he achieve if he transferred over the border to Carlow? His success is largely due to the fantastic Kilkenny team he has alongside him. The Sports personality of the year should go to someone in an individual sport, unless it's a really bad year, which it wasn't.

thirtyfoot

I'd put Donaghy ahead of Shefflin in terms of what he has achieved in GAA this year, and I'd put Eoin Kelly ahead of Shefflin even in hurling in the context of what he did in a poor Tipperary team, you are right Slowcoach, its easier to do well in a great team. George Hook is full of crap as always, couldn't go for Paul O' Connell as it wouldn't be fair on Ronan O' Gara and the other Munster players, yet he went for Henry even though that mightn't be fair on Cha Fitzpatrick and the other Kilkenny players.

pjbrady1

Hooks quote was "I once argued against voting for Sonia O'Sullivan as I thought we shouldn't celebrate finishing second"
Hang on a second, Munster are only champions of Europe a title, Sonia and Derval have won on their own, in disciplines where the only winning possibility is a lower time than your opponent. The only possible advantage your opponent can give you is to not turn up through injury or to slip on the day.
Henry Shefflin competes in a sport against realistically in 2006, Cork, Tipperary, Waterford, Galway. Wexford, Offaly, Limerick were'nt even close.
Shefflin was on either the best or second best team in Ireland over the last ten years.
Hook likes to be the expert on everything that is his problem. His quotes while entertaining are full of pompous nonsense typically along the lines of "When the great Nero seen Rome burning, he played fiddle, thats what Dan Carter is doing here, all around him is fire and brimstone, and he is playing Beethovens last concerto TOM ....!!!"

Common Sense

I, too, was surprised that Derval, Padraig Harrington, Katie Taylor and Bernard Dunne finished behind Henry Sheflin. However that's not my biggest problem - which is the method of selection. How can 6 'experts' in Soccer, Horse Racing, Athletics, Hurling, Rugby and Gaelic Football decide on personality of the year. I'd have no problem with a public vote or even 30 or 40 representative sports journalists, but six people???