By Irishexaminer.com,Maurice Brosnan, Croke Park
Copyright irishexaminer
This is a sport that crams a season into five months and leaves no room for replays. Even this spectacular and unprecedented spectacle, for all its novelty, can feel strangely familiar.
Which is the point really. In the end, the Pittsburgh Steelers ran out 24–21 winners over the Minnesota Vikings in a game that had just about everything an NFL enthusiast could ask for. There were blocked field goals, explosive plays, dramatic interceptions and a grandstand finish. Vikings quarterback Carson Wentz was under siege throughout in a display that included six sacks. Still, he had a chance to engineer a final game-winning drive. He couldn’t deliver.
“It sucks to lose, not going to lie, but I thought it was a cool atmosphere and tough one to lose out there,” he said.
There was much at play here in what is another frontier for the NFL’s relentless global push. Palestinian flags and banners were visible outside the ground. Throughout the past week, questions have been raised about the €10m government spend that lured the richest league in the world to these shores, about hosting a league with close ties to the U.S. military, some of which were visible in the ground.
Few within GAA HQ could have missed those concerns in recent days. Their decision to attend Sunday’s showpiece should not be read as disregard. There was, and still is, a need for a broader public debate about the implications of this game, even as people sought a moment of escapism in a world where so much feels tainted.
What people came to Croke Park for on Sunday is the same thing they have come looking for on Croke Park Sundays throughout history. Drama. Jeopardy. Rivalry. Release. A reason to roar and jerk out of your seat.
Set the singalong gimmickry to one side. Unless it’s Zombie. That is an Irish sporting tradition. Scrutinise extraordinary players operating in an unfathomably difficult realm. Did you see how that Wentz pass was a yard behind his receiver or how its low trajectory resulted in it being tipped? So what if he is plying his trade in one of the most demanding positions in all of sport? Today is not about the margins. Give us the theatre.
41-year-old quarterback Aaron Rodgers ground out a third win in four games. He threw one touchdown. Kenneth Gainwell rushed for another two. Rodgers started out being booed. He was sacked. He ended up throwing for 200 yards. There was one oddly electrifying moment in the second quarter when the veteran took off on a slow scramble. The ball popped out before he hit the ground but was recovered by Broderick Jones for a first down. Rodgers lay on his back, celebrating wildly, until someone drifted across to help him up.
These are football teams. Teams who kneel when a team-mate goes down injured, who gather round in consolation after a mistake or penalty. Players of every description. Some clinging on, trying to squeeze one more drop out of a career. Others fighting to hold a roster spot for another season.
DK Metcalf raised eyebrows saying he would do all of his sightseeing on the flight in and out of Dublin. This was a business trip. He was here to play football.
A blunt, but understandable sentiment. Despite all the pageantry, the star wide receiver still had a job to do. And as anyone who witnessed the 104-kilogram, six-foot-three athletic specimen burst toward the Hill for an 80-yard touchdown will attest, he can do it pretty damn well.
There were die-hard Steeler supporters in the 74,512 gathered crowd, like two-time Kerry All-Ireland winner Paudie Clifford. Travelling tourists. There were day-trippers. They all came in search of something fleeting, something that stirs the heart and lives long in the memory. It’s not unique to sport. It’s simply something sport allows us to feel.
That is what Sundays are for.
