1. Almost everyone in matching kit
The first round of the club championship, will see plenty of teams breaking out the new kit for the summer, with everyone wearing matching shorts and socks. Well, almost everyone, there’s always a corner-coward who’ll either be wearing different socks or have forgotten the new shorts he was given on Thursday night after training.
2. The “bring him in” talk
One forward whose not currently on Pat Holmes and Noel Connelly’s panel is sure to shoot the lights out, leading to plenty of sideline talk that they should “bring him in” for a look. The fact the guy he’s marking might be just coming back from injury or a lad just up from minor making his first championship start will be overlooked in all this talk.
3. Is he still playing ?
There’s plenty of grizzled veterans who’ve not every mentioned the thought of retiring, but when the casual club fan arrives to see someone the vaguely remember being involved with Mayo back in the mid-2000’s it shocks them that their still doing their bit for their parish.
4. Home from abroad
With so many 20 somethings having left Ireland over the past ten years, there will always be a few lads who’ve flown home from London or the likes for the weekend. They’ve been putting in the hard yards with Fulham Gaels or Fr Murphy’s or so they’ve told the manager. Twenty minutes in and that line will have been well and truly tested.
5. The county man getting dogs abuse
It’s one of the oddities of the GAA, that a player who people get fully behind all year long for the county will become enemy number one as soon as they line out against your club. Late hits and plenty of abuse from the sideline is whats in store for the unfortunate county man. But don’t worry come June 14 they’ll be supporting him 100 per cent.
6."How are they getting on?"
Thanks to the likes of Twitter real time updates from the other games going on at the same time are now available at the touch of screen. But there’ll still be plenty, who have’t moved up with the technology, bugging the young fella with a smart phone to check how so and so are doing.
7. The lad whose not playing because of exams
There’ll always be one fella whose not going to chance anything happening to him with a week of exams coming up next week. He’s probably a key player in the team and his decision to not be available for it will have manager and plenty fellas who played championship after a feed of porter the night before back in the 60s shaking their heads in shame.
8. Everyone’s just here to make the tea
The number of people who’ll claim to be on the club executive and only here to make the tea or operate the scoreboard will shoot up vastly as soon as they see, two lads from the county board waiting at the gate looking for €10 to get in.
9. Stand-offs over whose got the best spot to record the game
There’s not many self respecting clubs nowadays who don’t video every game for later analysis. Don’t be surprised to see in the near future a bit of a flare up on the far side of the field when the lads in charge of recording the game for their respective clubs, end up brawling over the best spot to do it.
10. "You never liked us ref!"
When your team is four points down with three minutes to go, there’ll always be some lark in the crowd who’ll be able to remind everyone around him that “you never liked us ref” and bring up the time he didn’t give a free when he should have in an Kelly Cup game back in 1993.
