1. “We’d a game one night against Cushendall up at the Glenravel tournament, and Armoy also had a semi-final in the soccer,” he recalls.
“I went and played the hurling match, and the next day some of the boys from the soccer club were telling me there had been a scout there from Wolves, apparently wanting to look at me. But sure I hadn’t a clue.”
Their loss was Armoy and Antrim’s gain and, as McFetridge advanced through the age groups, it wasn’t long until notice was served of his precocious talent with hurl in hand.
“He was a talented wee bastard,” recalls Cushendall legend McNaughton in typically robust terms.
“I marked him at U12, U14, right up through. He could just do things with a ball – control wise, touch, striking, catching over big men. In terms of physique, he would have been like a Maradona.
“Going to bed on a Saturday night, he’s the one player you’d be worrying about the next day. He could make a **** out of you very quick and very easy.
Thirty years since Antrim famously downed Offaly to reach the All-Ireland final, Neil Loughran catches up with Armoy magician Olcan McFetridge.
2. It is difficult to escape the obvious conclusion: that USA Gymnastics, which failed Biles and so many others so spectacularly, should not really still be standing. Last year the USOC began a push to decertify the body. Yet here we still are, with the expectation, certainly on the part of USAG, that its death sentence will be reprieved. While Michigan State has so far paid out $500m in compensation, none of Nassar’s victims has yet been compensated by USAG. Allegedly to expedite this, USAG has begun bankruptcy proceedings – but these have had the (intended?) effect of staying the executioner’s hand. It cannot be decertified until bankruptcy proceedings have been concluded. At this rate USA Gymnastics will still be running the show for the Tokyo Olympics next year, and perhaps for good.
Emotional @Simone_Biles expresses frustration toward USA gymnastics at the 2019 U.S. Championships. pic.twitter.com/eM9ameQw6e
— Olympic Channel (@olympicchannel) August 7, 2019
The congressional committee who wrote the report are outraged that declaring bankruptcy could buy USAG almost indefinite time. As one senator puts it: “Bankruptcy proceedings should not impede real accountability for bankrupt morals and leadership. American gymnasts deserve so much more than the inept and ineffective USAG.”
But will they get it? For all the leadership churn at USAG – they are currently on their fourth president since allegations surfaced – many senior officials remain in post.
In a particular irony, another part of the reason USAG enjoys success is because of Biles, the only gymnast who disclosed abuse by Nassar to be still competing. Double the crowds turned out for the women’s competition than graced the men’s event – record crowds – and they come in large part to see the historically sensational Biles at work. If only she could be permitted to have just one job – instead of both striving to win and having to push for justice against all the adults who did not do theirs.
Marina Hyde explains how US gymnast Simone Biles has redefined greatness in a sport that failed her.
3. I have always loved to write. When I was little, I remember thinking that English exams were a treat: an opportunity to sit down and play with words, to tip my imagination on to paper.
Some personal news...https://t.co/6DhG9cor9G pic.twitter.com/MxVPRpwMnH
— Nicky Bandini (@NickyBandini) August 16, 2019
As an adult, I have had the privilege to write for some of the biggest media outlets in the world, starting with this one. I was 23 years old and fresh from a 20-week journalism course when the Guardian’s online sports desk took a chance on me in 2006. I like to tell myself they never regretted it.
Anyone who has written for a living, though, knows that some days the words come easier than others. Finding the right ones for this piece has felt like hunting for moths in thick fog. So I shall fall back, three paragraphs too late, on the advice tutors gave me on that journalism course. When in doubt, begin with the version of the story you would tell a friend if you ran to meet them at the top of a hill and only had one breath.
I am transgender.
I know that sentence will come as a shock to many people. Even after struggling with gender dysphoria – a sense of discomfort with and dissociation from the body that life dealt me and the expectations that go with it – for almost my whole life, it took me the best part of three‑and‑a-half decades to be able to say it out loud.
There it is, though, in black and white. I have written my last article under the name Paolo Bandini. From now on, it will be Nicky.
The Guardian football writer Nicky Bandini comes out, but her passion for storytelling will remain the same.
4. Hyperbolic sales pitches aside, there is a far more sinister dimension to this circus in the Gulf. Hearn, by his own admission, is a “hustler for a pound note”, but he is also worldly enough, as the son of a self-made millionaire from a Dagenham council estate, to understand the soup in which he is swimming. For his set piece at the Savoy, he turned up with a list of watertight examples of how global sports could succeed on Saudi soil. Well, he thought he did. As it turned out, he confused Formula One with Formula E, and cited the case of WWE, whose stock fell after their dalliance with the Forbidden Kingdom last year.
For anyone with irons in this particular fire, there is an almost wholesale suspension of critical faculties. In a 14-minute interview segment on Sky Sports, which is broadcasting the fight on Dec 7, not a single question about the human rights situation was posed. This is despite Amnesty International raising continued concerns about Saudi Arabia’s crackdown on lawyers, women’s rights activists and members of the Shia minority.
When, eventually, Hearn was asked about sportswashing, he said he had never heard of the term, insisting glibly that any political matters were far beyond his pay grade. Except Hearn has accepted an estimated £33 million from Saudi sports entities to put on this fight. That makes him, whether he likes it or not, a pawn in a grubby political game.
Odd, is it not, that whenever Hearn is in full salesman mode, he purports to be the smartest, shrewdest operator in the business, and yet when he is pressed on the broader consequences of a decision, he resorts to playing the wide-eyed ingénue, shrugging that geopolitics is “way above my head”. One thing is true: where this greedy, soulless, misconceived Saudi enterprise is concerned, Hearn is already in far over his head.
Oliver Brown explores how boxing promoter Eddie Hearn is unabashedly putting profit before people in his decision to stage Anthony Joshua’s rematch with Andy Ruiz in Saudi Arabia.
5. The Crimes of the Ancient Sportswriter are many. My references are too damn old. I keep quoting “Animal House” which came out in 1978. Describing Chris Sale’s Yankee Stadium mound implosion last week I referenced “Ninja Turtle shoelaces” which is what Roger Clemens wore when he had his five-star nutty in Oakland way back in 1990. Did anybody get that? When the bogus David Ortiz shooting investigation turned up 14 suspects and a case of mistaken identity, I invoked Claude Rains who said, “Round up the usual suspects” (”Casablanca”) in 1942. Claude Rains has been dead for 52 years. Even Matty in the Morning mocked me on that one and he’s older than me.
When you get older, your audience grows older. Some of my loyal readers still write letters to the Globe. None of them read “Barstool” or play “Fortnite.’’
If a kid fresh out of college asks for advice, I remind myself how old I am to that kid. Back in 1975, fresh out of Holy Cross, would I have cared about anything anyone from the class of 1928 had to say?
I use old guy words like “swell” and “breezeway.” I have some clothes that are older than Nora Princiotti who has already covered three Super Bowls for the Globe. I keep phone numbers in a black book and have a weekly planner in which I register all appointments. I call people when I know they’d rather get a text. I never hit “reply all” on group e-mails, and don’t answer direct tweets because the last time I tried my message went to 85,000 followers. I keep quarters in my car to pay parking meters, even though I am told there’s an app for that. I write checks. I carry cash. I hand out cigars when babies are born. I have an alarm clock/CD player on my desk. I don’t even know what gluten free means.
I was the last guy in the world with AOL. It was embarrassing in crowded press rooms when my laptop would blurt, “You’ve got mail!” Peers said it was like working with Austin Powers.
Keeping up with the times is a challenge for the Boston Globe’s ‘ancient’ sportswriter, Dan Shaughnessy.
