Galway GAA discussion thread

boetstark wrote: »

Well done galway. Pity a out their low life fans chanting IRA at a sporting occasion.

Im assuming your referring to a few immature teenagers on the hill as opposed to every single Galway fan in attendance? And im guessing it was during the 'Fields of athenry' rendition?

Seriously though, is this all some people get hung up on after a hurling game?

boetstark wrote: »

Sorry didnt know about hill 16. Have a look at independent.ie. Far from being immature teenagers , grown men and women at it. This was done once by a few in Thomond Pk a few years ago. They were immediately told shut the fcuk up or else. Pity gaa fans couldnt do likewise.
Embarrassment.

Fair enough, it isnt on but id imagine its a minority. The Galway fans around me in the semi final were absolutely sound out. Ive never found their fans to be particularly bad and to be honest i can say that about every county. There will always be a minority of eejits though

What a day for Galway and in general what a unique and great sporting occasion. The hurlers have broken our hearts so many times over the years, they've been disparaged and been the butt of so many jokes, today the lads just had to put all that to bed and they did. More than joy its relief that is the overriding feeling in my mind. It's been an awful nerve wracking week waiting for the game as a supporter I don't have a clue how the players deal with it all. If we lost today I honestly think it would have been almost impossible for this team to come back again. We won the league, Leinster and the All-Ireland so no one can argue that 2017 was anything other than Galway's year. Hopefully we won't have to wait another 29 years or anything like it to witness another All-Ireland win.

Its been a long time coming but the great thing with this Galway team is that you know going up that they'll put in a performance, they'll stand up to the physical exchanges and there's an honesty of effort about the group that was lacking for a long time and that's all the supporters can ask for. Mentally the side is like chalk and cheese compared with some of the old teams.

If you'd told me a couple of years ago or even last year that the whole Sunday Game panel would nominate Gearoid McInerney as the player of the year I'd have laughed at you. His move to centre back has been the making of him and this Galway side. The league quarter final win over Waterford was a big turning point in our season. Winning that game everyone huge belief and confidence and we never looked back.

The improvement in so many of the players is a testament to the work being put in by the management. I think Anthony Cunningham deserves huge credit for having the conviction to introduce many of these lads but Micheal Donoghue has moulded them into a team that can go to war. Don't forget when he came in he had to phase out stalwarts like Collins, Smith, Tannian etc. and he did it almost seamlessly. For years the players on the pitch or those we had in charge on the sideline rarely inspired confidence but that's all changed.

The only downpoint of the day is that it had to be at Waterford's expense. My heart goes out to Waterford. They gave it their all, the players waited behind for the very long speech after. Their fans were superb, they brought great colour and atmosphere, really got behind their team, were very gracious in defeat and the vast majority waited around for the presentation afterwards which I don't think I could have faced if on the losing side being honest.

If Galway aren't to be champions in 2018, there's a lot of teams who you'd like to see get their turn at it but even more so after today would love to see Waterford do it next year. Its going to be very hard for them to climb the hill again though and they'll have to bring something different to the table if they want to be able to put up winning tallies in the big games.

Finally congrats to the minors. Cork were far the better team in the first half but like in the semi-final against Kilkenny they hung in there and in the early stages of the 2nd half made our move. We struggled to close it out but it was a great achievement against an impressive Cork outfit.

Hopefully this is the start of a new era in Galway hurling and we can start being regular contenders at the business end of the season. The burden has been lifted off future players and the frustrations, inconsistency and internal feuding are hopefully now a thing of the past.

For the next few months though we'll savour this one.