So, that’s a game every second night for 12 nights.
We thought David Clifford and the other Kerry lads’ schedules were overburdening, with three games played in seven days. How about six games in 12 days?
That’s what Clare footballer Ciaran Russell went through over a 12-day spell in the last fortnight. He played four games for the Garda College in both the Sigerson and Fitzgibbon Cups, and twice for his county in the National League.
All during that time, the recently qualified guard was working night shifts in Dublin and was frantically rushing between work, games and trying to get a small bit of recovery in.
It was hectic stuff for the Éire Óg, Ennis club man, and he admitted thatn by 20 minutes into the last of the six games, when his county took on Meath in the National Football League, his legs were just stuck to the ground and couldn’t give any more.
“It was really tough going,” Russell told SportsJOE.
“I don’t know how I managed to get away through the six games without an injury to be honest. I played the five full games and the first half of the other one. By the last game, I was really feeling it. I’ll be doing a lot of recovery in the next week.”
Here’s the exact schedule of games he went through in the 12-day spell.
It would be hard enough to fulfill such a rigorous and intense schedule of games for a professional athlete, but for a man working overnight shifts and travelling down the country to Cork, Clare and everywhere in between from Dublin – it really doesn’t bear thinking about.
“I suppose it didn’t help either, I’m only recently graduated from the Garda College, and I’m after starting a job up in Dublin.
“I was working nights and other shifts in that space of time, like before the game against Cavan, I was working until 4am on the Friday morning, and then I was leaving Dublin for our game against Cavan at 10am that morning.”
“Anytime I wasn’t working or playing, I was in the pool or out in the sea in Dun Laoghaire. In fairness, the Guards really looked after me in that regard and they helped me with anything I needed.”
Don't think any of the national media have picked up on this but Clare's Ciaran Russell has played 6 matches in last 2 weeks. 2 Fitz Cup with Garda, 2 sigerson with Garda, 2 league matches with Clare.
— David O'Shea (@jackosham) February 6, 2018
“But, yeah the whole situation is up in the air,” Russell continued.
“It’s not fair on players at all. Like for us in the Garda College, we were actually supposed to be playing a Sigerson and a Fitzgibbon game one day after another, so we had to ask them to change it.
“But seeing as we’re not really in college, we’re only there for 8 months, they weren’t really out to help us that much like.”
On a night when yet another Kerry young gun in Peter Crowley came off injured at half-time in a Sigerson Cup game, it’s time the GAA got rid of those stupid pre-season competitions, played the Sigerson Cup a bit earlier and enforced a blanket ban on players playing for their counties and colleges.
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