Ipswich Town player Stephen Hunt has responded to the criticism directed at professional footballers by Derry GAA legend Joe Brolly.
Stephen Hunt has hit back at criticism from Joe Brolly which was aimed at professional footballers.
The former Ireland international was annoyed by Brolly’s comments who said professional footballers were not good role-models for children and shouldn’t be proclaimed to be heroes.
However, Hunt feels Brolly is tarring the whole profession with the one brush, and feels his generalisation of footballers is unjust and unfair.
Hunt added fuel to the fire when he criticised GAA players and said the majority of them wouldn’t have the mental capacity required in professional sport.
It has caused a bitter Football v GAA row on social media players with players from both codes weighing with their opinion.
In his column with the Irish Independent Stephen Hunt said, “I started the article, probably on Joe Brolly’s comments, ‘could we be like heroes and stuff like that to children.’
“Listen, there are good pros and bad pros in any game – amateurs or pros or whatever you want to say, but for sure sometimes we’re tarnished with the wrong brush I think.
“He (Brolly) doesn’t know Monday to Friday what we do for the local community and stuff like that and how we deal with people, one or two people you have that can be quite rude to people and they want autographs and stuff like that, but generally there’s a lot of good guys that spend time with people and sign stuff and do things that would make children and adults happy for that matter.
“If hurlers and footballers turn professional, which would obviously be great in five or six years, if it’s going to go down that route, they would require rest. Because for one, training intensity would go up because they’d be training most days.
“Then their bodies might not be able to deal with it, pretty much like mine.
“In terms of the ratio of people that have come from Ireland to England at a young age on a professional level, thinking it was going to be rosy, 95% go home with their tail between their legs thinking it wasn’t for me and it was too tough for me.”
It’ll be interested to read Brolly’s response in his next article with the Gaelic Life.
