Photo: New York Times
Regular readers will know that I rarely make it to any of the FBD games. I’m based in Dublin so heading west in January to catch the pre-season action first-hand has invariably fallen outside my radar. In the seven years of this site’s existence I think I’ve only ever gone to two FBD matches and for one of these I already happened to be in the county for a family gathering the day before.
Because I never get to see these games myself, the match reports I put together for the FBD games tend to involve stringing a few words around the stream of Twitter score updates provided by @MayoGAA and other hard-core #mayogaa folk. These reports then invariably get embellished by comments provided by those who did see the action first-hand and so rounded accounts of these matches are gradually formed.
That’s all fine and as a system it works pretty well. In the area of match reports, however, first-hand reportage is always, I reckon, better than second-hand creative writing so I’m just wondering if there’s any interest out there in writing a few match reports on the upcoming FBD matches against NUIG (on 10th January), IT Sligo (12th January) and Roscommon (19th January).
I would see this as a logical extension of the guest post facility which has taken root so well on the site and has now become an integral part of what happens here. The reports wouldn’t have to be overly long (this is pre-season stuff after all) and what I’d be looking for is a concise and to-the-point account of what happened in the match. For it to work, though, I’d need to have the report ready to go on the site within a few hours of the final whistle.
This could be an opportunity for an aspiring sportswriter to produce content that will, as yesterday’s post about traffic to the site shows, be read by a large and expanding Mayo GAA online community. If you think this is something you’d be interested in – and bear in mind this is a labour of love activity, so all I can promise is, as Churchill once said, blood, sweat, toil and tears (and maybe the odd pint in Bowe’s the night before a big match up here) – then please send me an email (to mayogaablog@ymail.com) and we’ll take it from there.
I’d offer to do it but standard of reporting is dire
I’d have no hassle giving my opinion of the matches I’ll be at,hoping to get to the 3 fbd games, no guarentee yet tho. but no sports writer am I and only if there is no one else I can give my account of proceedings
As always WJ I’ll cover the photographic side for ya, but writing a match report would I think leave me in the same boat as a certain referee 🙂
Likewise – I’d be dire (and more than likely won’t make all of them either) but I’m sure there is someone out there who would be interested – will put the word out.
what about pebblesmeller?
I should be able to do it for ya WJ. Should be heading along to all the games, will be seeing my roster for my other job tonight hopefully and i will know then for definite but am planning on covering the games for CRC anyway. drop me an email when ya get a chance
Great stuff Mike, thanks – I’ll be in touch with you in a bit to work out the details.
I think you’re doing more than enough already, Mick – the site would be a far poorer place without your invaluable input on the photos side of things.
I’ll do it WJ, I’ll call me father after the match, who’ll have talked to me brother on the phone who may or may not have been at it, and ill transcribe it via a third hand account!
Alright….I’m just kidding 🙂
on route to under 21 game, there is a change of venue if anyone is heading into this.
http://www.killoegaa.ie/index.php/emmet-park
I very much doubt any writing you did would ever be described as ‘dire’.
Any result on the u21 match also fancy donegal to beat the dubs and hope mayo beat Kerry one of the top teams
Sean…….would you update us on the match if you get chance?
Sean Burke was it you who was saying Kavanagh would be one to watch for Galway? Unsurprisingly, he’s had a good start to the season … MOTM v Sligo … one to watch for sure
Thanks for the nomination Chisel. I hope to be at all the fbd games and if WJ is stuck I will try to bale him out. I was “off-line” for a few days so I only logged on this evening.