First Word: Just deserts for Gooch

John Donohoe's Inspire Column

I have to throw my tuppence worth into the Colm Cooper testimonial debate. Well I don’t have to, but the fact that I met Gooch once, when he was a gasun working behind a bar in a Killarney pub about 14 years ago, means that I’m entitled to have an opinion!
He was the up-and-coming young Kerry footballer of the day, and was most gracious in annoyance as he had to put up with some eejit of a Meath man shaking his hand in the nightclub afterwards, as he tried to have a quiet drink with his workmates.
Anyway, there I was, lying in bed on a recent Saturday morning, listening to Marian Richardson’s Playback on RTE Radio 1, drifting in and out of sleep, when I heard Sean O’Rourke’s interview with Paraic Duffy, the outgoing director-general of the GAA.
I thought I was listening to something from Callan’s Kicks. Or that Marian had gone back into the archives and pulled out something from Stalin’s Russia. Paraic was talking about the ‘rules’. He had gone off with his legal team to look at the ‘rules’ to see if there was anything to stop Gooch having his testimonial dinner, from which two charities will also be benefiting.
And Paraic seemed disappointed there was nothing in the ‘rules’ to stop it. Which I suppose is a surprise, seen as the GAA seems to have rules for everything else.
And he said that he told Gooch that he was worried about the impact this would have on Cooper’s ‘status’. Well, I ask you!

His status is a player with five All-Ireland senior football  medals, 10 Munster SFCs,  four National Leagues, eight All-Star awards and his precious All-Ireland senior club medal with Dr Crokes. A dinner in a fancy hotel isn’t going to change that status, even if the tickets are pricey, so the DG can rest easy. 
Cooper had said how he had been at rugby players Brian O’Driscoll and Ronan O’Gara’s testimonial events, and that they had been “amazing”. “Why shouldn’t a GAA player have one?” he asked. And he said that GAA players are making money out of punditry and autobiographies, “so if that’s the argument the GAA is making, I’don’t get it.”
Of course Duffy concentrated on the professionalism of the rugby players, but then let the cat out of the bag regards the pundits, like Colm O’Rourke, Joe Brolly and Pat Spillane, and the myriad of players who have produced autobiographies.
“They’re not taking money that could be going to the GAA,” he stated.

There you go. That’s what it’s all about. Gooch, after dedicating 15 years of his life to the GAA (and who’s written a book too!), and helping them fill Croke Park for many seasons, was depriving the association of a few quid. This, as many have pointed out, is the same GAA that has done a reported €55 million deal five year match broadcasting deal with Sky TV, depriving many people who don’t subscribe to the channel the opportunity of seeing big games live. 
It would be interesting to have a close look at the deals that the Gaelic Players Association have done with the GAA, to see what type of benefits members are accruing.
Five years ago, to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Meath GAA team’s All Ireland double of 1987 and’88, a massive gathering took place in Knightsbrook Hotel in Trim, at €1,000 a table, with the teams getting a holiday in Portugal and a few quid out of it. Is there any difference between that type of event and Colm Cooper’s dinner? There have been numerous other similar type of fundraisers nationwide.
That’s my tuppence worth. It wouldn’t get me too far. Regular retail price for Gooch’s dinner was reported to be €500 per head. And who would begrudge him it?