There's no sport quite like the GAA for the use of cliches. No matter what level of game you attend, you will always hear a few auld lads on the sideline spouting the usual type of nonsense.
The likes of 'he's flying in training', 'a wide is as good as a point at this stage', or 'where's your card now ref' will be heard at every game throughout the country without fail.
By definition a cliche is something that has been around for as long as time itself, and it is therefore very difficult for a new one to find its way into the lexicon of the game. However, we think we may have spotted one.
On the Three Man Weave podcast this week, the lads were talking about the opening set of Allianz league fixtures in both codes. One particular topic kept popping up in those games, so much so that it is now becoming a cliche in the sport.
We are of course talking about the team holiday.
Team holidays are a right of passage in the GAA at this stage. Successful teams often go away together as a group at the end of the year, but these trips are now permeating into the general conversation around the sport itself.
The fact that teams were away on holiday was mentioned numerous times in the televised games, both in a positive and negative sense. It is definitely becoming a trend:
PJ: One of the things I have noticed, it hit me there this morning when I was thinking about Tipperary against Limerick. Maybe I'm late to this, maybe it's been around for a while.
It's the 'they're not long back from the holiday'.
When we're talking about the performance Tipperary put in in the second half, people are like 'they were good in the first half but they tired there in the second half, sure they're not long back from the holiday'.
Same thing said about Dublin. 'It was a good performance from Dublin, and they're not long back from the holiday.'
So it can be used to say there is a lot more potential in this team, or to explain a bad performance.
Mark: I think Colm O'Rourke said at the weekend that the only place Dublin haven't been on holiday at this point is the moon.
PJ: I'd like to point out, Kerry are also not long back from a holiday.
Gary: Like all good GAA cliches, it means nothing really. It can be used as a good thing, a bad thing, or nothing at all.
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