Tommy Walsh: For me the worry isn't about the players themselves, it's the risk of bringing it home to a family member with an underlying condition or an elderly parent

Kilkenny hurling legend Tommy Walsh believes it would be extremely hard to justify a return to GAA action without the discovery of a vaccine and reckons the main danger for the players would be the risk of bringing something home to those closest to them.

The Tullaroan clubman was talking this morning ahead of the Darkness into Light 'Sunrise' Appeal which takes place this Saturday morning, May 9th. As a result of the current global situation surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic, the annual Darkness into Light will not now take place this year but the organisers are still appealing for as many people as possible to still donate what they can and still come together at a distance by getting up at 5.30am to watch the sunrise this Saturday morning.

“I’m honoured to be an ambassador for the Darkness into Light ‘Sunrise’ Appeal." explained Walsh.

"I encourage everyone to get out of bed at 5:30am (on Saturday) and wear yellow to show support to those struggling with their mental health. As the restrictions in Ireland continue, the role that Pieta plays in the lives of its service users is becoming increasingly more important as many people continue to feel alone and isolated in quarantine.

"It is vital that we support them so that they can keep their centres open and continue to provide their essential services.”

Darkness into Light is organised by Pieta and proudly supported by Electric Ireland since 2013. It is a global movement dedicated to ending suicide and supporting those who engage in self-harm. By walking from Darkness into Light (Or taking part in this year’s Sunrise Appeal) participants play an important role in removing the stigma around suicide and self-harm as well as raising vital funds to fight suicide.

In 2009, in the Phoenix Park in Dublin, 400 people set-off on the inaugural Darkness into Light 5km walk to raise funds for Pieta House. From small beginnings, the movement has grown year on year and in 2019 more than 200,000 people took part in 200 locations around the world.

Like thousands of others Walsh has had to quickly become accustomed to social distancing, cocooning and restricted movement in recent weeks in an attempt to play his part in overcoming this dangerous virus.

Despite the country wide ban on all team sports at present, the 37-year-old is still managing to work on his flicks and tricks with a hurl in his hand albeit in his back garden for the time being.

"I'm working from home, most days are the same here Monday to Friday. I get up early in the morning and work away throughout the day. It's the evening time really where everything changes.



"I just dived into the whole remote working and complete home life really. I remember listening to an interview with Ger Loughnane on Off the Ball a few years ago and it really had a great influence on the way I was thinking.

"He had got very sick that time and he had to go to hospital up in Dublin for quite a while. Rather than question things and say why me the whole time, he just said to himself right I'm going to dive into this as best I can and whatever they ask me to do I'm going to do.

"Since then, I've always felt it's a great mindset to have, extremely positive and one story which has always stuck with me.

"That's the way I've taken to this current way of living really. I decided to just dive into it, I finish work in the evening and I have been enjoying being outside until half nine, ten o clock each night. Not wondering about hurling or anything else really for the moment. I've started playing a lot of games of tip the can lately, in fact I spend about an hour every evening playing tip the can!

"Taking sidelines, flicking the ball, we have a goal since I was a young lad and we've a big garden out the back that we can hurl away in so the main thing I'm missing from my own hurling is the competitiveness of it. I'm missing the excitement coming up to a training session, the excitement that a match brings as it gets closer, the overall craic and bond we have as a team."

The GAA announced on Wednesday evening that they don't expect any inter county games to take place before October with every county requested to suspend training for the foreseeable future.



Whether we see club action before that remains to be seen with the constant debate of club v county set to role on well into the summer months it seems.

For Tommy, having enjoyed a stellar career in the black and amber of Kilkenny and more recently enjoying All-Ireland success with his club Tullaroan in January he is well placed to have a strong opinion on the topic and for him when the question is put to him, equal importance should be placed on both Championships.

"Often the argument is the club vs the county but I think we need to look at them both side by side. I'm lucky enough that I am able to see it from both sides having been there both with Kiilkenny for so many years and now more recently back with Tullaroan.

"Without these inter county stars we'd have no youngsters striving to get there as well. They're out there pucking a ball off a wall for hours every day trying to be TJ Reid or Patrick Horgan. Those players are their Ronaldo's and without them we wouldn't have these young fellas coming through with their clubs and keeping the whole thing alive so I would say it doesn't matter which comes first, let's look after both of them side by side because I think both of them are hugely important.

"I think they could be both pushed forward together, you'd have a condensed Championship maybe that could be knockout only but again the big challenge is just to get the players be it club or intercounty back out there and feeling comfortable being back out there.

"I don't think the biggest challenge would be structure, a structure of some sort could be organised for both Championships.

"I think the crowd thing would be a challenge that we could get over. You go and ask any fella that's playing for an inter county team at the moment. He'll remember winning an under fourteen county schools final when there might have been fifty people at it and it was probably one of the greatest days of their lives. I don't think from a players point of view the crowd is going to matter. I think that challenge could be overcome by putting out your social distancing guidelines in the stadiums.

"If you have a 30,000 seater stadium you could put in whatever number is safe to do so that's a challenge that I feel we can overcome but the biggest challenge of all is the players.

"It's a contact sport, you're marking a tidy little corner back for who could be up beside you for sixty or seventy minutes and that's the challenge we need to find a solution for. If there was a solution that could be found here and remember it's not the players themselves."

A very valid point made by the Kilkenny man, during a media zoom call, was that the fear and risk isn't necessarily the players themselves, it is the possibility of them bringing something home and passing it onto a high risk relative or elderly parent.

"Every player I feel would be happy enough to go out and probably take that risk but it's the risk of bringing it home to somebody is huge or giving it to somebody else, that's the biggest danger. It would be a no brainer to get up and running if it was safe to do so from a players point of view.

"I think we have to look at the big picture here, obviously it can't go on forever that we remain cocooned and not able to do a thing. It will be a lot easier once a vaccine is found as then you'll be able to probably take that risk because there is a known thing there. until that happens it's so important that we go by the guidelines of the WHO and our own HSE.

"You have World Rugby, American Football, basketball, there are plenty of contact sports out there on the world stage that will be getting plenty of professional advice from around the world so if they can't go back, we can't go back. If some of these world sports are getting the correct advice that they can go back and it is deemed safe to do so well then the GAA can look to see can we make it safe for us to do so.

"I'm missing the competitiveness of it. I miss winning at a training session, losing at a training session, winning a match, losing a match and most of all the whole competitiveness of it. I'm at home every evening though and we're hurling every evening for a couple of hours.

"Usually at this time of the year we would have three Championship games at the moment, we would also have played a good few Leinster league games maybe three or four and as I said already it's the competitiveness that I'm missing most.

"I tell you I can't wait to go back, there's going to be a clatter of lads running to take the first sideline cut with all the practice going on at the moment. The touch is good at the moment but it's a lot different when it's in the back garden and you've no one dragging out of you."

For the moment Walsh and the thousands of other GAA players across the country will have to put up with the various skill challenges being shared across social media and the individual training regimes being set for them.

Tommy Walsh was speaking to the media during a virtual zoom session in his role as an ambassador for Pieta Houses Darkness into Light fundraising drive.

Pieta was established in Lucan, Co. Dublin, in 2006 and now has 15 centres across Ireland. Pieta offers free counselling to those suffering from suicidal ideation and to people who are engaging in self-harm. Pieta operates a Suicide Bereavement Counselling Service providing free counselling, therapy and support to individuals, couples, families and children who have been bereaved by suicide. Staff are fully qualified and provide a professional one-to-one therapeutic service. Pieta Resilience Academy is an initiative to teach school going children positive mental health techniques and strategies. The Resilience Academy is a six-week, evidence-based programme that was designed ‘with schools, for schools’. The programme aims to provide students with skills and coping mechanisms that are needed to succeed in school, and throughout their adult lives.

Pieta also operates the free 24-hour suicide helpline 1800 247 247. For more information, visit www.pieta.ie

Darkness Into Light is Pieta’s flagship fundraising event.