A Hurlers Tale

A HURLERS TALE

CHARACTERS:

TOM - Windgap Hurler - 1951 Wears an old long red sleeved woolly jumper Long white shorts Ordinary dark socks Hobnailed boots His hurley is dark coloured and old looking. He has an old brown ball. DICK - Windgap Hurler - 2001 Wears current Windgap jersey, shorts, socks, helmet and Adidas boots. His hurley is present day with insulating tape wrapped around it. He has a present day white hurling ball. HARRY - Windgap Hurler - 2051 Wears red lycra top, ski pants and full frontal helmet. The sponsor is “Soft Micro Computers” His hurley is plastic. The ball is present day but painted illuminous yellow.

SCENE:

The three hurlers stand on stage and talk individually about their hurling era. Direction as required

* * * * * * *

TOM: The year is 1951. My name is Tom, I’m a farm labourer. I earn about three pounds a week. I was up at six this morning milking the cows, feeding calves, hens and pigs. Went to the creamery on the horse and cart. Came back and carted out the cow house. Then I dug spuds for the dinner, thinned turnips, cocked hay, scarted ditches and that was all before dinner. Look at the welts on me hands... (Shows the palms of his hands) What will I do for relaxation this fine summers evening? I tell you what.. I’ll cycle down to the cross field for a few pucks.

DICK: The year is 2001. My name is Dick, I’m a computer programmer. I earn over £40,000 per annum excluding benefits and bonuses. I have a company car. A lovely black “Beamer”. I was up at seven this morning because I wanted to make an early start and beat the traffic into Waterford. I had a busy day. Three meetings and wrote a dozen lines of code as well as debugged the general ledger-payroll Interface which had communication problems. I was home by six. Tonight, I’ll grab a bite to eat and head up to the field for training at half past seven.

HARRY: The year is 2051. My name is Harry, I’m a professional hurler. I make about 2 million Euros per season excluding endorsements. I was up at eight this morning... I couldn’t sleep... About 10:30, I went to the all weather training facility at the Lamogue Cross. I trained for two hours before breaking for a light vitamin lunch. At 2:15 we went to the players meeting room at our floodlit stadium in Tullahought to discuss tactics for our next game. The stadium has a capacity of 40,000. The pitch surface can be packed away and the roof closes in so that rock concerts can take place. Tonight, for relaxation I’m going to boot up my virtual reality computer and relax in sunny Barbados.

TOM: I play for Suir Rangers, a Piltown based team in hurling and I kick football for Cotterstown. There’s no such thing as parish rule.

DICK: Just parish priest rule

TOM: A bit of respect, young fella. In fact we won the northern junior football this year. Well, it was after an objection, even though those chancers Spike Rangers thought they had us bet. Then do you know what?

DICK: What?

TOM: We bet Castle Rovers from Goresbridge in the county final after that. Anyway the local hurling team in the forties around here was St. Joseph’s from Tullahought. I did some good tough hurling with them. Both Suir Rangers and St. Joseph’s are junior teams.

DICK: Some things never change.

HARRY: Yes they do.

TOM: We have no pitch of our own and Joseph’s used to hurl in Powers field up in Tullahought. Six nights a week. Two hours hard hurling followed by at least six laps of the field. You had to be tough especially after a hard days work. One of the older club men trains the team. Himself and four selectors. Tough task masters.

DICK: I play for Windgap We‘re a junior team. We have our own pitch and club rooms up in the village. A typical training session involves warm up exercises, laps and sprints for about 45 minutes. This is followed by a game which can vary from three goals in, to a full match, if enough of the lads turn up. Our trainer is from a neighbouring parish. We look after his expenses. After training we have a shower, a chat and go home.

TOM: We had some heavy showers in 1951. It was a bad summer.

HARRY: I play for Windgap. We’re sponsored by the multi-national computer company, Soft Micro. We’re one of the strongest clubs in Europe. I turned pro a few years back and I’ve never looked back. Our trainer was an international hurler in the 2030’s and won a hurling world cup medal in 2034. You know, Ireland have won every world cup to date. Our training sessions and diet is all scientifically designed by a team of top class scientists at the research laboratory situated here at the Slatequarries. The aim is to achieve the ultimate standard on a consistent basis. The better I perform the more I earn.

DICK: We call that prostitution....

TOM: Hurling was a tough game in the forties and fifties. We had no helmets or protection. We’d cycle to some farmers field, those of us who had bikes, tog off by the ditch and jump into a nearby stream if necessary on a hot summers evening. Sometimes the grass was so high you’d lose the ball in it. There was plenty of ground hurling though.

DICK: Hurling is one of the fastest games in the world. Unfortunately it’s still virtually a single nation sport dominated by a handful of counties situated mainly in the southern half of the country. DICK Everyday facilities are improving with almost all clubs owning their own pitch and dressing rooms. Television coverage is growing and financially the © Copyright 17 May 2001 Author: Seamus Norris Page 2 A HURLERS TALE

G.A.A. is a lot more lucrative. With increased T.V. coverage the sky’s the limit. God knows what effect this money will have over the next fifty years.

HARRY: I know too, but sometimes the fans call me God. Since the G.A.A. allowed professionalism in 2026, the sport of hurling has grown world wide. However it is still dominated by Ireland. When Sky took over the T.V. rights from RTE, money poured in from all over the place to benefit the game at all levels. It’s amazing the statistics they do. Apparently, I hit the ball once in the last game I played and it travelled all of twenty yards.

TOM: Young lads. It’d take four of ye to pull a buchal-lawn!

HARRY: Anyway, underage is the only remaining part which is still amateur. This is expected to change at congress next year. It is planned to have a trial professional league for under-14’s. They’ll be able to earn about 60,000 Euros per game.

TOM: In the fifties it was tough.

DICK & HARRY: So you said.

TOM: You’d have to be dead before they’d allow a sub in.

DICK: They brought in a new blood rule this year. You have to go off if you have a blood wound, but you can bring in a sub who is not included as one of your five subs.

HARRY: It’s a real squad game since they introduced the specialist team rules. We have one fellow who comes on to take the frees and they goes off again until the next free. I’m telling you he wouldn’t want to miss many or he’d be sacked.

TOM: We finance the club through dances. We run a great one down in Ashgrove, Mooncoin, Met the missus there.

DICK: You met Granny at a dance in Mooncoin? Janey Mack! We got a lot of money from the national lottery to build our clubhouse. Outside that we depend on membership and club functions such as cards, race nights, raffles, the hurlers co-op draw, dinner dances and sponsorship from local companies and individuals to keep the club going. I met the girlfriend at one of the club functions in a Kilkenny Hotel.

HARRY: You met Granny in Kilkenny? Janey Mack! Since our club was bought out by Willie Gaps Soft Micro computer company, we have become one of the richest clubs in the country. A season ticket costs 20,000 Euros. My first wife had a season ticket. My second had two.

TOM & DICK: Janey Mack!

TOM: In my day we only had four seasons.

DICK: Ah sure the seasons are gone mad now. You wouldn’t know what season you had.

HARRY: Whatever about the season’s, the scoring has changed too. You now get six points for a goal.

DICK: If we scored a goal, we’d drink six pints.

TOM: We could barely afford a pint. © Copyright 17 May 2001 Author: Seamus Norris Page 3 A HURLERS TALE

But it was a better game. More ground hurling. Better men. A tougher game.

DICK & HARRY: So you said.

TOM: Stronger men. Skilled stick men. This is the golden era. The fastest and best team game in the world!

DICK: Our game is fast and skilful. Tactically superb. Unabated excitement. This is the golden era. The fastest and best team game in the world!

HARRY: Our game is all about tactics, speed, skill, strength and stamina, oh and money too.. A product maturing for almost 170 years. It’s ripe. This is the golden era. The fastest and best team game in the world!

TOM: We were lucky, a local man used to drive us to matches in his lorry. Some lads might cycle. I remember one game, thirteen of us piled into a horse and cart and headed off for a game.

DICK: The company “Beamer” is great to get me to matches.

HARRY: You can’t beat the helicopter when you’re running late getting to a match.

TOM: The local scene is booming. We have great clubs like Dicksboro, Carrickshock and Eire Og. There’s a fine team coming on in Bennetsbridge.

DICK: We’ve the strongest club scene in the country at the moment. You’ll get very few better than Graigue-Ballycallan. Young Irelands and Glenmore have some fine hurlers. The Shamrocks of Ballyhale are on the way back and Dunnamaggin are the strongest of locals.

HARRY: Best club side in the country after almost 100 years of trying... Windgap. We can beat the socks off of the lot of them! Who would have believed it back in the 20th Century?? Windgap, All-Ireland and International club champions.

TOM & DICK: Not me.

HARRY We’re going for three in a row this year. Mind you, we have a tough one against Rathmore from Kerry.

TOM: The inter county level is even better. Tipp are going for three in a row. I’d watch out for Cork and Wexford over the next decade.

DICK: Kilkenny are still winning All-Irelands. 26 so far. Clare and Offaly have had their moments in the last few years. You can never rule out Cork and even Tipp and Galway. Wexford and Limerick have had their day though. The back door system was useful.

TOM: Back door system me back passage, we couldn’t afford a back door.

DICK: No, but you’ve a fine back passage!

TOM: Go way out of it or I’ll give you a flake of me ash stick.

DICK: It’s a quare shape but I suppose it’s better than yer man’s plastic one.

TOM: At least we can make our own.

HARRY: Go way out of it, credit cards are a thing of the past. It’s all electronic transactions now. Anyway, Kilkenny are going for their 50th All-Ireland this year. We’re meeting Leitrim in the final. Leitrim really benefited from the new rules they came up with in 2015. Weaker counties such as Leitrim and Cavan had to be beaten by 20 different counties before they were knocked out of the championship. It increased the number of games that they got immensely. Loads of T.V. coverage too. Mind you, this is the first time any of them have succeeded in using the system to get to the final... I can’t understand why it never helped Waterford though! I guess it didn’t help when they knocked the bridge into Waterford to stop us Kilkenny people crossing and taking there jobs. It was only then that they realised they couldn’t get out of their own county themselves. A pity they couldn’t get it rebuilt before the EU funding ran out in 2010.

TOM: We have the greatest players ever. Legends one and all. From our own county there’s such great men as Paddy Grace, Diamond Hayden and Johnny McGovern. Then there’s the Rackard’s from Wexford, Tony Reddan from Tipperary, the greatest goalie that ever lived and of course the one and only legendary Christy Ring from Cloyne in the county of Cork.

DICK: Never were they better players than there is now. Some of the finest hurlers that ever lived are playing for Kilkenny at the moment. God himself is playing at the moment. He uses the name DJ Carey... His disciples play as well, Charlie Carter, Henry Shefflin, Denis Byrne, Andy Comerford, Noel Hickey and bould red dragons, Peter Barry and John “fire in his heart” Power. Of course the other counties have a few skilful players as well. Like John Leahy from Mullinahone and Tipp. Brian Corcoran of Cork, Jamsie O’Connor of Clare and millennium man, Brian Whelehan of Birr and Offaly.

HARRY: Never has there been such great exponents of the game of hurling. Young JD Carey, grandson of the great DJ. Who says you can’t breed hurlers? Fair play to genetic engineering and cloning. We got a new signing last year. Mor Fitz we call him. His grand uncle was the great Kerry footballer, Maurice Fitzgerald. Mor can kick a sliothar over the bar from the 65 metre line. Dunnamaggin signed an outstanding player this year. Murphy.. Ahmed Murphy. And the best centrefielders in the country come from Cork, Mohommed Ali Naseem and Vladimir Gorbachev. Still young Dick Ash from Piltown is a player to watch in the future. Some say he’s an android.

TOM: I love hurling.

DICK: Ah it’s a great game for sure.

HARRY: The rules may have changed. The teams may have changed. HARRY: The structure may have changed. The names and faces may have changed. But the game is still as magical as ever. Hurling...

TOM, DICK & HARRY (To the tune of “Football Crazy”)

Oh we’re the Windgap hurlers. We play in red and white. And on the field, the ash we wield. We’re always full of fight. In Nowlan Park or Piltown, We’re always to the fore. With a clash of ash and mighty dash, We all shout it’s a score!

Oh we’re hurling crazy, we’re hurling mad. And the hurling it has robbed us of the wee bit of sense we had. It would take a dozen servants, our clothes to wash and scrub. Since we became members of the local hurling club

Now the wife she says she’ll leave me. If at times I cannot keep. Away from playing hurling. At night time in my sleep. I’d take an nice oul side line puck. Or double on her pole. Last Night, I kicked her out of bed. And swore I got a goal!

*** THE END ***