Don't mention the R

The only thing more fashionable than giving out about the Recession is giving out about the people who give out about the recession, if that makes sense? You see from what I’ve found over the past couple of months people of certain age seem to take some kind satisfaction in delivering bad news on jobs, money, houses e.t.c, I’ve stopped listening to these people also not watching the news helps as well because its time to inject some positives into our lives, for one thing I’m going to stop saying “Recession” from now on its “The R”, every time I do say that word I’m putting €2 into a jar so already this piece has cost €6.


The next step is the positives, you’ll have noticed I’ve gone through the first paragraph without any mention of sport that’s because sport is the positive to counter act “The R”, its this time that the sporting year really kicks off.


Last week in the six nations we were treated to one of the finest displays of any Irish team in recent memory we now have a real chance to win the championship we have a team that seems to finally be able to transmit the provincial success of Munster and Leinster to the International stage, Brian O’Driscoll rediscovered his scoring touch and to see Gordon D’Arcy return to the Irish team and score the winning try was the icing on the cake, if you want a prime example of coming back from the brink that’s it , Gordon had been out for over a year with a complicated broken arm that needed surgery on multiple occasions but to return in this manner is almost straight out of the movies and it couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.


This win sets us up nicely for a great 6 nations campaign and certainly gives the fans a few more days out to look forward to.


Also at Croke park during the week we had the Irish soccer team get the qualification for the World cup firmly on track, It wasn’t a complete performance and we are still short of a few dominating midfielders but we have got the results we’re level on points with the Italians and a home game with Bulgaria is still to come, historically speaking during recession times (€8) Ireland have done well in football competitions, Stuttgart ’88 and Italia ’90 for example, If we do qualify for South Africa at least the funny wig makers, inflatable hammer sellers and publicans can look forward to making a few extra euros that may very well kick start the economy!

What about at a county level we have the National league which only started a week or two ago, the league sometimes doesn’t get the credit it deserves its seen as the championships poor cousin or if your from Cork it’s a chance for the players and county board to publicly denounce each other, either way its unfair to slate it, the chance to watch a hurling or football match under floodlights on a Friday evening is a fantastic outlet. For 10 or 15 euro you can be entertained by some of the top sport stars in the country, you can forget the woes of “The R” for 70 minutes. The league serves as a perfect appetiser to the championship it allows managers to blood new players and find future stars I always enjoy seeing new or relatively unknown players staking a claim for a spot in the championship team. Counties do seem to be taking the league more seriously now with the likes of Tipp and Waterford in the hurling recently fielding almost full strength teams which gave us a highly competitive game and a much needed lift for the dark month of February. The same could be said of the highly competitive football opener between Dublin and Tyrone.

Outside of these main events that are currently entertaining us at a domestic level, across the water we have the final stages of champion league and not least the premiership which comes into its own at this time of year the managerial merry go round is in full swing and with Liverpool and Arsenal in freefall, Aston Villa and Everton in the ascendancy we have a great finish to look forward to.

Which brings me back to my point we’re in a recession “€10” that’s a fact but it doesn’t mean we should focus on the negatives that surround it, if we did that we’d never leave the house. As sports fans we should consider ourselves lucky to be witnessing these Irish success stories I’ve only touched on a couple of events happening over the coming months there’s still more to come and for a country of our size to have all of these outlets is outstanding.
So to all of the pessimists who are constantly talking about “The R” my advice is to shut up and catch a game every once and a while it’ll do ya the world of good.