Liam O'Neill was a man truly befitting of the GAA role he served and the legacy he left.

Micheál Clifford

ONE OF THE less endearing characteristics of this profession is the amount of times you get to mount a high horse.

We have saddled plenty in our time, but one which stands out was when we went for a gallop back in 2014, after the GAA’s CCCC fixed the Kerry/Mayo All-Ireland football semi-final replay for the Gaelic Grounds in Limerick.

The GAA’s decision was not some time-delayed tribute to Charlie McCreevy’s infamous plans for decentralisation, but one which was forced upon it because Croke Park was booked out for an American Football colleges game on the Saturday of the replay, which meant that an alternative venue had to be found.

We raged – and we were not hamming it up – that at the business end of the football championship, one of the biggest games of the year would be taken off the main stage and sent to a fringe theatre to accommodate the American tourism market.

We had it out with the GAA president at that time too, Liam O’Neill, and committed our withering contempt for the decision to print, with the gist that a game of such importance was befitting of a grander stage and, therefore, the occasion would be diminished as a result.

That aged particularly well as a game which rocked and rolled like we had never witnessed before, one which played to the rhythm of the deafening din of a packed stadium and which demanded extra-time just to ensure that everyone was sent home sweating, became one for the ages.

Long after the dust had settled on the championship, we did not run into Liam again until the post-season All-Stars tour to Boston that November, where one of the evenings is traditionally given over to a media dinner.

Arriving late, the only seat left was the one alongside him, and we took it rather tentatively. When the waiter came around for the order, Liam took the menu and proclaimed, “I will have the steak and this gentleman alongside me will have the humble pie, but just make sure it comes in a plate befitting of it,’ his face creasing into laughter.

That was the thing about him, he knew the dance better than we did. There were the obvious lines between press and officials, but even when shots were fired across them, it never meant that there had to be a closed border as a result.

That is why, when we heard of his passing this week, the sense of loss within the GAA family and to those of us outside of it was felt deeply.

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He was a straight-talking, warm-hearted, razor-witted man, who made for the most intelligent and compelling company.

Legacy

He was also one of the most significant leaders in the modern history of the GAA, his legacy so real you can literally reach out and touch it, because the difference he made back then has shaped so much of what had transformed the GAA for the better now and, also, into the future.

Vision is a word easily bandied about, but he gave it meaning.

Quite rightly, Jim Gavin’s FRC, commissioned by Jarlath Burns, will be seen as the fork in the road which released a game that had become hopelessly shackled to tactical whiteboards, to the one that is rocking our world now.

But the GAA has never opened its door to change without persistent knocking, and in many ways, it was Liam O’Neill’s FRC, under the leadership of the late Eugene McGee, which knocked loudest.

It sought to address many of the fundamental issues which sabotaged the game, seeking specifically to address the blight of cynical fouling with the introduction of the black card, which went a long way to curtailing the third man tackle.

It introduced the concept of the “mark” for kick-outs, a defined advantage rules all of which have been incorporated and expanded in the current game.

It proposed public match clocks, increased sanctions for dissent and for players cynically holding up play when frees were awarded, and even got around to a discussion about a two-point dividend which was ruled out on the grounds that it would require a new arc to be drawn. More than anything, it opened up awareness that the game would be swallowed whole if it remained a sitting target for coaches.

He also had to front-up to what was perhaps the most contentious argument to envelop the GAA when it agreed to putting games behind a subscription pay wall when Sky paid for a piece of its broadcasting rights pie.

O’Neill was the one who had to face the anger of those who argued that the GAA’s long term financial security was secondary and that if it was to remain true to its community-based structure its games should be free to consume.

That argument still rages today, but if the GAA did not take a stance back then, would it have been as comfortable in putting a price on its games, accessing the streaming revenues which have now become essential across the country for county boards and, ultimately, to the establishment of GAA+, where it has cut out the middle man.

Those still enraged by putting the games behind paywalls have still to answer Liam O’Neill’s question as to where the revenue so essential to the sustainability of the GAA will come from?

And the financial sustainability bar will be raised ever higher in the years ahead, when the GAA finally becomes a fully integrated Gaelic Games body, which will demand unprecedented levels of both capital and current expenditure.

Integration

The timeframe for the integration to go from the conceptual to reality is next year, but the more challenging question is when did that process truly begin?

The answer to that with Liam O’Neill, who was more than just a passionate advocate for it, but walked the walk too.

In his three-years as president (2012-14), he was proactive in getting the process started, addressing the central council of both the Camogie Association and the LGFA.

“We made the offer to them to join, you cannot force a marriage,” he reflected a few years ago.

In time, he will be seen as a facilitator of that marriage and much more.

Back in 2012, after his sister had passed away, Liam singled out Michael Murphy’s sense of empathy for taking the time to sympathise with him prior to handing over the Sam Maguire.

It revealed much about Murphy’s character, but also it revealed how Liam O’Neill was perceived, a man who invited an act of decency because he was a reflection of that very quality.

He was a man truly befitting of the role he served.

And the legacy he left.