Sports Review of 2024 [Pt. 2]

In Gaelic football most talk was about the rules and former Dublin player and manager showed the faith new GAA president Jarlath Burns and together with his Committee came up with rules which should save the game which had become tedious to watch. Armagh’s All-Ireland final win over Galway was a good example of how boring Gaelic football has become to watch, where it’s all about possession. In the Junior All-Ireland final New York beat London by one point in the final which played at Croke Park. [See Sports Review of 2024, Part 1, here.]

Thankfully hurling doesn’t need a rules committee and Clare’s All-Ireland final win over Cork was all that was good about the ancient game. Hurling only needs to clarify the hand-pass, which some former players claim is the equivalent to throwing the sliotar.

The Ladies Football Association celebrated their 50th anniversary and Kerry one of top teams in the early days of the association, won the senior final for the first time since 1993, beating Galway in the final. Later in the year the death occurred of Brendan Martin, the man who bought the original cup for the Ladies competition in a jeweller's shop in Fownes Street, Dublin. In Camogie Cork won both the senior and intermediate finals.

As usual there were plenty changes in the intercounty managerial merry-go-round. The most surprising was Mickey Harte’s decision to leave Derry after one season in charge and move to Offaly. Harte, who had led Derry to their first National Football League title since 2008, made a surprise move to Offaly. Colm O’Rourke didn’t manage to turn Meath’s fortunes around in his first two seasons in charge and walked after the County Board put pressure on him to name his new backroom team. In hurling Davy Fitzgerald quit Wexford and joined Antrim, while former Kilkenny star Henry Shefflin quit Galway to return to his native Ballyhale Shamrock.

As usual Cheltenham in March provided a showcase of our great record in National Hunt Racing. Willie Mullins is the trainer the English fear as they know that the County Carlow-based trainer is capable of winning any big hurdle or steeplechase race once he targets the race with one of his many horses in training. Last March Mullins passed the magic 100 mark, bringing his total for Prestbury Park to 103. That “ton” included Galopin des Champs winning the Gold Cup where Cork-born jockey Paul Townend equalled Pat Taaffe’s record of 4 Gold Cup wins.

On the day Mullins saddled his 100th winner at the Festival, Tipperary-born Rachael Blackmore was dubbed Queen of Cheltenham after she rode Captain Guinness for trainer Henry de Bromhead to victory in the Queen Mother Chase. Two months earlier Rachael became the first female jockey to win the Thyestes Chase on Ain’t That a Shame at Gowran Park.

In April the Mullins-trained MacDermott won the Scottish Grand National, the first Irish winner of the race since 1869. So no surprise that Willie became the first Irish-based trainer since Vincent O’Brien in 1954 to be crowned champion over the jumps in Britain. Then at the Punchestown Festival in early May Mullins broke Dermot Weld’s longstanding training record when Ballyburn won a Novice Hurdle to take Mullins’s career total to 4,378 winners. His first winner was Silver Batchelor at Thurles in February 1988, which Mullins rode himself. Paul Townend is Mullins’ first choice jockey, but he could only finish second to Jack Kennedy in the jockey’s chart, a Kerryman beating a Corkman in racing. In the Irish Grand National at Fairyhouse the winner was Intense Raffles, ridden by J.J. Slevin.

If Mullins is the number one National Hunt trainer then Aidan O’Brien is king when it comes to flat racing (the other O’Brien is the only person to have been champion in both in England). The current Ballydoyle-based trainer, who trains mainly for the powerful Coolmore group, won the Epsom Derby for the 10th time with City of Troy. A few weeks later O’Brien made it a English-Irish double when Luxembourg, who was third at Epsom, won the Irish Derby at The Curragh to give O’Brien his 16th Irish win. English jockey Ryan Moore rode both winners. Later in the year O’Brien and Moore teamed up win two big races at the Breeders’ Cup in Santa Anita, Unquestionable and Auguste Rodin, saw O’Brien become the first trainer to win the same race at the meeting seven times.

Meanwhile on the other side of the world Kildare-born jockey Robbie Dolan became the first Irish jockey to win the Melbourne Cup, when riding the 80/1 outsider Knight’s Choice to victory in the race ‘that stops a nation.’

And Mullins admits that the Melbourne Cup is a race he would love to win. After being named Manager of the Year in the annual RTE awards, Mullins said: ‘‘Even though we are predominantly jump racing, we always have a selection of Flat horses. It’s fantastic to be able to go to places like Royal Ascot, York and to Melbourne, and to have runners at those big festivals. That's what keeps you going and gives you something to aim for every year. Due to the of the nature of our yard, we don't have two-year-olds and three-year-olds and Classic horses, but we have older horses that can run on the Flat. The Melbourne Cup is probably the world’s biggest race that we can achieve in from our base.’’

Katie Taylor got a second win over Amanda Serrano in Texas, a fight that was watched by an estimated 50 million people on Netflix. Taylor was deducted a point for leading with her head, but all three judges gave the fight to the Bray-born boxer. There was talk of a fight at Croke Park for Taylor, but at this stage I don’t think it’s going to happen and some supporters of the 38 year-old are hoping that Katie will quit while she is ahead.

During the year we lost some well-known sports people. One of the most famous of them was neither a player or manager, but a commentator -- Micheál O Muircheartaigh. The Sheehy family from Tralee are legends in the GAA and John Joe Sheehy and his son Seán Og, who died in May, are the only father and son combination to lift the Sam Maguire Cup. John O’Mahony held an unusual record in the GAA in that he was the only man to manage Mayo, Galway and Leitrim to win Connacht senior football titles. Two of Down’s stars from the sixties, passed, goalkeeper Eamon McKay and full-back Dan McCartan. We lost former soccer internationals Charlie Hurley and Joe Kinnear. Hurley was known as the ‘King’ at Sunderland and Kinnear was on the Irish team that beat the USSR 3-0 at Dalymount Park 50 years ago. He later has success as a manager in England in Wimbledon. Jim McLaughlin was a Northern Ireland international, but Jim will probably be best remembered as one of the most successful managers in the League of Ireland with Dundalk, Shamrock Rovers and his native Derry City. Tony O’Reilly was an exciting Rugby player and later a successful businessman. He won 29 Irish caps and was selected for two British and Irish Lions tours, to South Africa in 1955 and Australia and New Zealand in 1959. His record of scoring 38 tries on two tours still stands. O’Reilly later became a successful business man with Heinz and Independent News and Media.