Donegal Great Eamon McGee Goes Against The Grain On State Of Modern Football | Balls.ie

Pretty much every GAA columnist, pundit and former player is calling for a change to the rules of Gaelic football in order to make the game more exciting.

Despite a very entertaining match between Galway and Dublin last Saturday that shook up the whole championship following the exit of the reigning champions, most of the aftermath from the weekend has been focused on Kerry’s victory over Derry.

The lack of entertainment, intensity, and general enjoyment in that game made it a very hard watch, and with Jim Gavin currently overseeing a committee to bring back the ‘good ‘Ol days’ of Gaelic football, where the ball was kicked more often, and games were exciting, the common consensus is that this process should be sped up.

However, Donegal legend Eamon McGee isn’t sure that there ever was a ‘good ‘Ol days’ to go back to, as he makes the point that this supposed era of swashbuckling football maybe never existed in the first place.

Taking to the social media platform ‘X’ the Ulsterman made the point that GAA fans have developed a sense of entitlement when it comes to the modern game.

Went back to the YouTube GAA rabbit hole this week. I’m trying to understand where this entitlement we seem to have about Gaelic football that every game has to be a classic, where did it come from?

“I’m no further on anyway.”

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The 2012 All-Ireland winner raises an interesting point, because there have been plenty of drab games in the ’80s and ’90s, the so-called golden era of free flowing football.

When football became unentertaining in the first place is up for debate as well, because some would lay the blame at the feet of Mickey Harte and his Tyrone team in 2003 who dethroned Kerry and won the All-Ireland by playing aggressive football, where the forward was the first defender.

Pat Spillane famously labelled this as ‘Puke Football’ but when Jim McGuinness came to town in 2011, his Donegal side shocked everyone by bringing every player behind the ball in the All-Ireland semi-final against Kildare.

It was seen as an extreme tactic at the time, and they did enhance their attacking game the following year when they went on to lift Sam, but now bringing everyone behind the ball is common practise.

That being said, McGuinness is back at the helm with Donegal and his side are racking up ridiculously high scores in almost every game with a real spread of scorers on the field.

Ultimately, it does look like change is coming, but McGee does offer some food for thought about the power of nostalgia and how it can warp our memories and over-romanticise things.

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