A Different View with Dave O’Connell

Those who spend a huge slice of their wages and their everyday lives watching ‘live’ sport on Sky don’t really know what they’re actually missing out on.

Admittedly, it’s cheaper and more convenient to watch the Premiership at home or down the pub as opposed to going there – because, to be there in person, you’ll pay at least two hundred quid for a ticket and you have to add in the cost of getting and staying there.

But the Premiership isn’t the be-all and end-all of sports; there is plenty to actually see in person closer to home that doesn’t have to cost the price of a small car.

There is nothing I enjoy more than making the short walk up the Dyke Road on a Friday night to Eamon Deacy Park to take a seat that never varies by more that two or three places from about four rows in front of the press box in the middle of the big stand.

Most of us there have season tickets but, in the League of Ireland, that doesn’t give you an assigned seat – so we subconsciously assigned our own. Because it’s the same familiar faces surrounding you for every home match.

I’m sure the same sensation is experienced by the Connacht Rugby fraternity; the season ticket holders there will have the same assigned spot in the new Sportsground – and what they have in common is that this is an occasion as much as a match.

The GAA is the same of course; from the club matches where you can stand beside the dug-out to the biggest days in Croke Park where you just hope you can get a seat with a clear view.

The point is that you don’t get any of this watching the television. Yes, you have the perfect view and, if you miss anything, you can just scroll back with the remote or if you’re very lazy, just wait for the replay.

You’ll see it from six different angles – but you don’t experience it at all.

You don’t know if the wind or rain is a factor; you don’t see the runs that players are making off the ball; you don’t see the aminated debate on the touchline – a guarantee every home game at Terryland – and you don’t get the feeling of being part of a tribe even if you don’t know any of the rest of them.