Did it not destroy the fabric of the GAA?
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I actually think that the price of housing in Galway will push people back out again. A city bypass would do more for the rural clubs in Galway than 5 Shane Walshes.
City clubs are all bad, rooral clubs are all good mate. Fall the fuck in.
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It’s the rightly or wrongly we are debating.
It is all conjecture though. Maybe it’s just convenient for both. Lads here saying sure it’s only 4 or 5 games have no idea. You don’t get to be a Shane Walsh without absolute commitment. He wouldn’t brook rocking up on match day for the start. He’d be all in or all out. I’d say he’s exhausted and burnt out. He probably fancies a break, and I’m sure he fancies a chance to commit to mingling with locals in Dublin where for better or worse he is committed for at least two years. I don’t think either has done anything wrong. Maybe the club made an offer? So what? Maybe Shane accepted, again it’s no big deal.
There’s nothing in the world better at manufacturing outrage than the GAA.
It’s not like he transferred to corofin.
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Inter-county GAA ended on July 24th.
Nature abhors a vacuum.
People want to talk about inter-county GAA. They want to argue furiously about inter-county GAA. It is a national pastime, an obsession. Traditionally the space between matches allowed for saturation level discussion and analysis by ordinary followers. By the end of the week followers would be intricately familiar with every movement of every player in every minute of the previous weekend’s match.
But the championship season just gone did not allow that. The rushed nature of it was such that there was no time for absorption. Matches flew past like the name plates of stations at which the express train you are on is not stopping…Fonthi…vroom…Hazelha…vroom…Salli…vroom…Newbr…vroom…
There might be more podcasts than ever before, but the rushed nature of the calendar led to information overload. Before, people would go deep into the underbelly of a match. Controversies would last for weeks. Now they skim read like Twitter scrolling. No time to settle. No absorption. No depth to the season. Just a blur.
And now it’s over, and it feels like we’ve eaten an undersized portion of overpriced pasta at a restaurant. No starter. No dessert. The appetite not whetted. Unsatisfying.
So nature is filling the vacuum with what people want. The managerial merry go round has found a hidden power setting nobody knew it had, and we are on board.
The Shane Walsh transfer is a major controversy, not because any of us genuinely give a shit - we don’t - but because we need it to be a major controversy, we need it to be, we need it to be. We need it to be something communal that engages people from every corner of the island.
Because there’s nothing else to chew properly on. Club round robins in front of three men and a dog replacing the glorious seven week stretch of All-Ireland semi-finals and finals of August and September in front of 70 or 80 thousand people roaring like bears at Croke Park, it’s like nibbling on one digestive biscuit when it’s 9pm and you haven’t eaten properly all day, it’s like Villagers at Whelans replacing Oasis at Knebworth.
The Shane Walsh transfer. The one last vestige of excitement and anger and dopamine in what is now a zombie summer.
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You need a hobby. Get you out of yourself.
A terrific piece of writing.
I can picture myself on that train.
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I find myself nodding in agreement with this synopsis, I particularly liked the Digestive biscuit analogy. You certainly have your moments. 
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How many “ Cashel “ lads are playing with Cashel? Not a whole pile
Transfers are part and parcel of the landscape in South Tipperary. They treat GAA like junior soccer
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This is the case in point.
Shane could have timed it all so much better.
He could have expressed this feeling earlier in the year as opposed the week before Dublin championships are kicking off?
If he was able to tour up and down for County training I’m sure he could have at least toured back down for club matches? Why not train with Crokes and transfer once his club championship in Galway was done?
Why did he get a PR man to put out a Statement?
The level of disrespect shown to his club is off the charts.
By all means transfer next January when you’ve seen out the season. If Crokes want him that badly they’ll wait.
The hassle he’ll cause to a small community is needless and plain disrespectful.
The cheek of him to state for cameras recently that the club was what really mattered, winning with lads he grew up with.
The Association should make the same rule cutoff for all transfers and this shit acting could be curtailed or at least carried out in the off season.
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You’re some gom if you believe that tripe you posted there
Cahill has paid his dues in spades. His head was turned though in much the same way as Walsh’s has been here.
Liam has matured some amount tbf. You’d imagine Walsh at 29 would have more smarts but alas….
This is gas stuff altogether.
Without that clubs work Walsh isn’t the player he is today.
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At what stage of the year did that transfer go ahead?
It’s the optics here with Walsh & Crokes carelessly doing this a week after an AI & weeks before the Dublin club championships kick off.
Kinda fuck you to the lot attitudes.
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How do you know the crowds at club matches when you attended none this weekend and their was also none on tv? 2 matches i was at at well over a thousand people.
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Not that I noticed anyway
I would let Walsh off anyway. That club in Tipperary has survived losing 5 of its best players. If he wants to go let him off.
Crokes told Shane that Hibernia South Dublin was like Blue Mountain State and he needed to be there.
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