A Klondike-style claim jump by the officials and worthy burghers of Waterford City Council could result in the legendary Rose of Mooncoin having to strip off her Black-and-Amber jersey on the banks of the Suir and don instead the blue and white of the Decies county, reveals An Fear Rua...
This GAA boundary clash between the historic neighbouring counties of Waterford and Kilkenny is the unlikely setting for a dash of Elizabethan politics. Yet, the Elizabethan legacy in Ireland of county boundaries has politicians, people and GAA mentors on both sides of the majestic River Suir at loggerheads. (By the way, that's Queen Elizabeth I, monarch of England from 1588 to 1603 - called, for some reason unfathomable to an Irish person, Good Queen Bess). Left unresolved, this dispute could introduce a real grudge element into the longstanding, but never bitter, rivalry between these two stalwarts of the ancient game of hurling.
The current inter-county row has its roots deep in history and geography. Waterford City is the Republic's fifth largest city - once dubbed 'The Untarnished City' because of its unswerving loyalty to the obscure English monarch Henry VII - and it lies almost entirely on the South bank of the River Suir. For many miles upstream and a few miles downstream of the city, the river forms the boundary between the counties of Waterford and Kilkenny. Indeed, in other phases of its flow, the Suir also forms the boundary between Waterford and Tipperary as well as Waterford and Wexford. Thus, this loveliest of the three South Eastern rivers dubbed 'The Three Sisters' has had a profound effect on the hurling fortunes of the people born on either bank of it.
Born on the Waterford side, and you live in a county that has managed to win only two senior hurling All Irelands - the last one in the year Dev was first elected President of Ireland. 'Dev Who ?' An Fear Rua can hear his younger readers exclaim. But, have the good fortune to be born on the Tipp or Kilkenny banks and you're part of counties that have more than twenty such titles to their credit. And even further down, on the Wexford side - Arthurstown, Duncannon and the Hook peninsula - you're in a county that has won five All Ireland senior hurling championships, the last in a most glorious manner in 1996.
The problem now is that Waterford City has been expanding rapidly and needs more lebensraum for its citizens. Historically, one of the city's Northern suburbs, Ferrybank, is on the Northern, or Kilkenny, side of the Suir, though its club has always played in the county Waterford championships. That's because big cities like Waterford, Limerick and Galway are what An Fear Rua's legal friends - God help them ! - call 'county boroughs'. That means, that as they expand, they bring their county with them, rather than straddle two counties. But sure what would you expect from a bunch of lawyers, An Fear Rua enquires - lads that wouldn't know 'wan' end of a hurley from the other.
On the proposition of a Workers' Party councillor no less, Waterford City Council has called on An Fear Rua's old pal, that great Wickla' man, the Minister for the Environment, Dick Roche, to redraw the county boundaries to allow Waterford City take in a goodly chunk of South Kilkenny. The city say they need more room to build houses and factories and that the move makes sense because Waterford's new port is actually on the Kilkenny side of the river as well.
However, many staunch Kilkenny hurling fans believe this is Waterford's way of increasing its hurling strength by stealth, at a stroke of a Ministerial pen in a big office beyond in Dublin. What Waterford has failed to win on the field of play by fair means, they now propose to win by foul, these stalwart sons of the Black-and-Amber argue. And not without some reason, asserts An Fear Rua. For, depending on where the new county boundary is drawn, it will be less than a mile or two from a veritable 'Who's Who' of great Kilkenny hurling clubs - Mooncoin, Slieverue and Glenmore (the current county champions), with Kilmacow and Mullinavat only a few more miles away.
The Kilkenny fear is that once the precious acres now coveted by Waterford are ceded, it will only be another few years before famous clubs like these will be swallowed up by the expanding Decies city and county. Overnight, four or five leading Kilkenny clubs, with the likes of Dennis Byrne and Willie O'Connor among their star players, would find themselves playing in the Waterford county championships. Even Kilkenny's current county song, about the famous Rose of Mooncoin, would have to be transferred as well !
Of course, An Fear Rua reminds his readers that the irony is that these county boundaries - so beloved of the GAA and its followers - are not a native Irish creation at all. They were imposed in the late 16th century by the cartographers of her gracious majesty Queen Elizabeth I of England as part of her efforts to subjugate the unruly Irish. So, these 'units of the GAA' - as our 'ofeeshals' solemnly call them - are often only the result of doodling on a map by some Elizabethan courtier clad in doublet and hose.
In many cases, the county lines follow neither logic nor reason nor even make much sense in GAA terms. But for a quirk on the map, for example, the pocket of Offaly that has driven the county's remarkable success in inter-county hurling since the Eighties should actually be in county Tipperary. And then there are the poor misfortunate 'ownshucks' who have been destined to dwell in All Ireland-less Laois, rather than in Kilkenny, because of a slip of an Elizabethan quill on a piece of parchment showing north of Castlecomer. Other examples abound: the sprawling town of Ballinasloe straddles both Galway and Roscommon, Kilcock divides between Kildare and Meath, Monasterevin is split between Kildare and Laois, Clare has nervously eyed Limerick's efforts to expand its bridgehead on the Ennis Road even further into the Banner County. And the example under review - South Kilkenny/Waterford City has been a single economic entity for hundreds of years.
Indeed, another of An Fear Rua's great pals, the former All Ireland-winning Wexford manager, Liam Griffin, has gone on record stating that county boundaries are the enemies of the proper development of hurling. This wise man has instanced Carlow, a barren hurling island cast between the riches of Kilkenny and Wexford. Would it not help raise the standard of hurling in Carlow if the clubs there competed in the neighbouring Kilkenny or Wexford championships, while continuing to play on a Carlow county team ? A radical thought, but one that makes a great deal of sense, thinks An Fear Rua, since regular contact with a higher standard is one of the surest ways of improving standards in hurling.
An Fear Rua's correspondents in Kilkenny assure him that feelings are running high on this matter. That's understandable. AFR recalls hearing stories that back in '48, the year of Waterford's first senior All Ireland victory, a star of the team named Andy Fleming, lived in the Ferrybank suburb. Things got so hot for Andy after the victory, that he had to move out of the place for a few weeks until the Kilkenny feelings had died down (even though it was Dublin who were the defeated side.). And there are apocryphal stories of Waterford cars being stoned as they ran the gauntlet of Kilkenny in '57 and '59 on their way to and from meeting The Cats in Croke Park.
The charge against the Waterford anschluss is being led by former Fianna Fáil Minister of State for Sport, Liam Aylward TD. Liam, of course, is the son of the late Senator Bob Aylward, a decent man and a Kilkenny GAA stalwart for many years. Liam is right. Tinkering with historical boundaries is a dangerous idea. After all, look what happened in the Balkans...
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