There were two moments of contrasting emotion for me in Saturday’s Division 1A meeting of Tipperary and Galway. The agony: Rory Burke rattling Rhys Shelly’s net in the 40th minute at a sodden Semple Stadium. The ecstasy: Darragh Stakelum’s reply just after the hour mark.
No, I’m not a Tipp fan, I’m simply a late inductee to the world of fantasy sport.
Score Beo’s latest offering of Allianz Fantasy Gaelic Games launched last week in advance of the opening rounds of the national leagues. Given I’ve never previously dipped my toe in such ventures, the sports department had their guinea pig.
Although I had been pondering my selections for a few days, I only got around to putting my cards on the table on Friday evening, which proved my great undoing. Faced with all the players who had slipped my mind in the planning phase, I was suddenly second-guessing every choice I thought had been set in stone. I could have spent the guts of a day applying logic to my 38 choices – 19 players in each panel, 15 starters and four subs – but I needed to get this knocked off my to-do list since playing fantasy sport is not (yet) the entirety of my job description.
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The positions are broken into goalkeepers, forwards, midfielders and backs, with a maximum of three players per county. Each player can only be chosen in their allocated position, but forwards and backs can be slotted in anywhere in the half and full-forward/back lines.
With the rules of engagement accepted, I managed to whittle down the glut of intercounty talent to my two panels of Duffy’s Dynamos (a fairly awful name, but it’ll do) from which I knighted my starters for the opening weekend.
If hindsight is 20:20, it was also – in my case at least – excruciating. A ball hadn’t even been thrown in before I started to wince at the thought of my poor choices.
I could accept when I just plainly got it wrong. I put Donegal’s Michael Murphy in full forward hoping he’d do damage in their opener against Dublin, but no sign of him. The pain of this blunder really came from my leaving Louth’s Sam Mulroy, who had a stormer against Offaly in Division 2, on the bench in Murphy’s favour.
Then there were the pure howlers. I threw Ciarán Thompson in midfield alongside Derry’s Conor Glass – that’s the same Ciarán Thompson who picked up an ACL injury in last year’s All-Ireland final, which only dawned on me when I sat down to watch the Dublin-Donegal match and realised he was nowhere to be seen.
[ Ger Brennan era off to losing start as Donegal take down Dublin at Croke ParkOpens in new window ]
A similarly egregious error came in my selection of Gavin White, likely ruled out for Kerry’s entire league campaign with an ankle injury. In the excitement of still having another spot to give to the Kingdom after putting Seán O’Shea and David Clifford into the forwards, I acted with reckless abandon and got caught out.
But the selections that really left me seething were where I had tried to apply reason. Take TJ Reid – a prime candidate to be given the weekend off for Kilkenny’s hosting of Offaly, but I thought him likely to feature after being named captain earlier this month. The same balancing act led me to leave Tony Kelly out.
But I couldn’t blame too much on my over-thinking, evidenced by my almost crippling embarrassment when I saw I hadn’t swapped Niall Morgan in for Rory Beggan in goals. Did I not think the Scotstown man deserved a few weeks off after reaching an All-Ireland club semi-final? By the same token, what was I doing selecting anyone called McGrath from Loughmore-Castleiney?
It wasn’t all doom and gloom. Clare’s Mark Rodgers proved an inspired choice, as did Tipperary’s Darragh Stakelum and Rhys Shelly. If I had used my sub forward, Offaly’s Adam Screeney, in place of Galway’s Evan Niland I would have been singing.
The fantasy leagues had me watching this weekend’s matches with a clenched jaw, praying Pádraic Joyce would throw on Shane Walsh, aggrieved by Adam Hogan’s yellow card, irked by David Blanchfield’s omission, and generally caring more about scorers than results.
It was a tumultuous weekend for Duffy and her Dynamos, with some of my selections bordering on a sackable offence, and maybe my nerves would be better off if I called it a day while I’m already behind. But you best believe I’ll be back next weekend, armed with my learnings from round one, determined to go again.
We have may have created a monster.
♦ You can sign up for Allianz Fantasy Gaelic Games through the Score Beo app
