On Monday morning as I headed off to work, I tuned into Today FM and Paul Collins’ report on the Irish rugby team’s historic win over the All Blacks in Chicago. The emotion of the report made me think back to that buzz and adrenaline you only get from performing on a big occasion.
Sport is a funny old thing, you either love it or hate it. When you love it and compete at the top, it’s all that matters in your life. It consumes much of our young lives, often forcing us to make personal sacrifices in order to pursue our dreams. Nothing else counts and your world revolves around your chosen field. When time catches up on you and the body indicates it’s time to slow down, it is difficult to let go and step out of the bubble.
Whether it is sport, music, voluntary work or whatever else; if you have dedicated over a decade of your life to something, it is very tough to walk away. For most sportsmen and women, retirement is a concept that they do not wish to think about in great detail but due to age, injury or exhaustion, every career will eventually come to a close.
This week a few of my old teammates bid farewell to the county scene. Marty O’Brien and Damian Kelly will have made the difficult decision with a heavy heart. They will be a huge loss and leave a large hole in the Fermanagh rear-guard. They may aim to continue playing with their clubs but the adrenaline and so called glamour of representing their county will leave a void in their lives.
When I first stepped away from the Fermanagh team, I missed the banter and enjoyment in the changing room and the satisfaction of completing a hard training session. In my head I believed I was still able to compete at the top but in my heart I knew my body was not at the required level. I wanted to continue but as Pete McGrath pointed out in the case of Marty O’Brien’s retirement through injury, “Maybe ten to twenty years ago players could get away with doing less training and putting in less time but now that is just not an option.”
Playing county football brings a discipline and a routine to your life. It creates an environment where you are always striving to improve. In my later years I liked to pit myself against Marty in the many runs Peter Canavan put us through. I was never going to beat him but just trying to keep pace with him meant pushing myself to the limit, even if he was only going at half pace!
Club football and training still provides me with that small boost of competitive adrenaline but to turn off the switch completely can be difficult to deal with as Tyrone’s Enda McGinley stated a few years after he was forced to quit due to injury. He said, “For me, there is a complete lack of interest in exercising. Every reason for exercising was football, when I go out for a run there is no voice pushing me. That voice has just switched off, and it’s really annoyed me because I want to exercise, I want to be fit but my motivation has just gone.”
At first, the boys may think they will switch off and have more time for some of their other hobbies, possibly spending some time on the golf course. This may be the case for a short while but the reality is much different. Like most retirees, at their age they have young families and the ‘me time’ will not last long. Work and family will take over and they will wonder how they even found the time to play county football for so long.
Come next May when Fermanagh run out against Monaghan in the Championship there will be a few men in the stand watching with that strange feeling that this is a new chapter in their life. It’s only when that first Championship game is played, the butterflies will start again and you feel a sort of longing that you were still out on the field. The team will move on with your full backing and support but sitting watching those first few games, especially the Championship games, is very peculiar. You feel slightly envious and like you’re kicking every ball with them!
But as I said, the feeling doesn’t last long and life takes over. After a few years the boys might find a new sport or interest to fill the void such as golf, running or the sport du jour, cycling. And soon, they won’t even miss it at all. As American author, Dr. Seuss once wrote, ‘Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.’