The great English Victorian novelist, Charles Dickens, once immortalised the contrasting fortunes of Paris and London in a memorable work, ‘A Tale of Two Cities’, recalls An Fear Rua …

Perhaps if Dickens were alive today and living in Ireland, he might re-title his magisterial novel as ‘A Tale of Two Counties’. And what more contrasting counties, superficially at least, could he find in GAA terms, than Waterford and Meath? One the one hand, there’s a county strong in hurling tradition and achievement, but perilously weak in gaelic football, while in the other county the situation is ‘vicey versa’, as that wonderful creation of Seán O’Casey’s – The Covey – used often say in ‘The Plough and The Stars’.

These contrasting fortunes were underlined in recent successive meetings of the two counties in the Allianz football and hurling leagues. In the first encounter, at Páirc Tailteann, in Navan, the Meath footballers hammered Waterford by 3-11 to 1-6. A week later, the hammer was on the other foot – so to speak – when the hurlers of Meath travelled to the famous Fraher Field, in Dungarvan, and were on the receiving end of a 4-12 to 0-6 pummelling.

Yet, historically, these two counties are much closer than might at first be imagined. Waterford is well-known by the gaelic name of Na Déise. In the heart of county Meath there are two baronies known as Upper Deece and Lower Deece. That ‘Deece’ is a corruption of the gaelic name for the tribe of Déise! Indeed, the same two baronies are home to many of the more famous names in Meath club football – the likes of Dunboyne, Blackhall Gaels, Drumree, Dunshaughlin, Dunsany and Summerhill. Many centuries ago, part of the tribe of Déise trekked all the way to West Waterford, in a major migration, and settled there. Obviously, in their haste to depart, they seem to have brought only the hurlers and must have left all the footballers behind. Or, more likely, the hurlers were made of sterner stuff. History further records that this tribe of Déise in Waterford were converted to Christianity by Saint Declan, even before the great apostle Patrick himself landed on the shores of Meath in 432 AD, thus giving them an early ‘one up’ on their erstwhile colleagues in the Royal county.

However, if we aggregate the scores of the two recent League games an interesting picture emerges. On a combined score of 4-18 to 4-16, Waterford emerge as slightly ahead, but we see that the fortunes of the two counties are much more evenly balanced, with only a couple of points dividing them. Could this be the bones of part of a solution to the perennial debate in Dis Great Assooosheeayshun Of Ours about how to achieve a better balance between the fortunes of hurling and football in the so-called 'weaker’ counties? Rather than the hurlers of Meath and the footballers of Waterford languishing in a trough of despair and disappointment, after yet another ‘thrashing’, how about if they had an incentive to score as much as possible, knowing that this would assist their county’s overall aggregate result?

The idea would be to have a new, special knockout competition where every county would be obliged to field both a senior hurling and a senior football team. Counties would meet in hurling and football – on the same day and at the same venue, ensuring a good turnout of followers of both codes - and the aggregate score would decide which county would go through to the next round. The ultimate victors would earn the title of ‘Best All Round County’. You could immediately see how so-called ‘weaker’ counties in hurling, the likes of Leitrim, Kildare, Roscommon or Wicklow would have a huge incentive to take part in such a competition, since county pride would be bolstered by the conjoined performance of their footballers. In addition, there would be ‘mixed’ counties like Westmeath, Offaly, Laois, Carlow - even Limerick and Tipperary – who could aspire to doing well and, of course, the big ‘guns’ like Cork and Galway would expect to turn out strong teams in both codes.

At a stroke, this competition would flush out those counties where one game or the other is neglected, in favour of the ‘stronger’ game, whether that be hurling or football – though, truth to tell, more often than not it is hurling that suffers at the hands of football. The most blatant example of cowardice in consistently not fielding a senior football team is, of course, Kilkenny. This county basks in the glory of more than twenty hurling All Irelands, and in the hurling League game after the encounter with Waterford, handed out a major drubbing to Meath. But AFR has far more respect for Meath and Waterford, aye, and for the likes of Carlow, Wexford, Limerick, Tipperary, Offaly, Laois and so on, who struggle manfully to field senior teams in both codes, year after year. Where would the GAA be if every other county emulated Kilkenny’s ‘cop out’ approach? We’d be down to a ‘national’ association of about nine counties in hurling, and round about twelve or thirteen in football.

And where in the Dickens would that leave the GAA?…

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