Galway Giants Update

Where are they now??
Galway Giants squad 08-09

Ronan Shaughnessy: From Australia to Austin, Cincinnati to Claremorris, Montreal to Mullingar, Shaughnessy has seen it all since his departure from the Giants. Has made regular guest appearances through subsequent years, still making trademark bursts from defence with catastrophic consequences for his team. Rumoured to be battling a serious weight problem despite being a regular gym monkey. He had been spotted in the Kingfisher up to three times a day with sessions lasting an average of four hours before his latest departure for Canada. Currently taking part in an Australian Rules tournament in Texas where the stadium announcer informs the crowd after each Shaughnessy score “Ronan is sponsored by Charcoal Grill”.

Trivia: Ronan finished runner-up to Gary Neville in a “Worst Sporting Facial Hair” poll conducted by Shoot magazine in 2010.

Kieran Coffey: Still flying the flag as one of only three remaining Giants. Also the last Giant employed by D.B. and Co. where he now has no competition to be “the boss today”. Coffey continues to be the rock at the heart of a leaky Giants defence which has gotten considerably worse as the years pass by. Still has an argument with the referee at the start of every game when he tries to bring his hurl onto the pitch. This seems to have a positive effect on Coffey though, as he starts every game willing to run through brick walls for the Giants. Showed his skilful side in last weeks game when curling a sweet shot from 25 yards into the top corner to draw the Giants level. Unfortunately the rest of the team then sat back and went on to lose 6-2 with Coffey being heard to mutter “This wouldn’t be let happen in Athenry, if only I had my f**king hurl”.

Trivia: Kieran finished second in the bi-annual “Who can climb through the smallest window in the office” competition in March ’09. The competition was won by Padraig Moran who was rumoured to be practising at home which was outside the rules of the competition at the time, leading to him being stripped of the gold crown awarded to the winner. Being the proud man that he is, Coffey refused to accept the crown. Enda Thornton duly accepted it having finished third and immediately tried to flick it onto his head but resulted in flicking it onto the roof of Crowes Bar on Bohermore where it remains and each Spring the rare barn swallow come to roost.

Declan Coyne: Men want to be him and women want to be with him. Galways answer to Ross O’ Carroll-Kelly, Coyne came to grow tired with “quaint little Galway” and upped and left for Dublin after the 09-10 season. Being the man-whore that he is he put a lot of thought into the type of image he wanted to portray to the ladies of Dublin. This led to him renting a plush home on the southside-sharing with a renowned GAA player, a multi-millionaire and a northsider; investing in (two) soft-top convertibles and mingling with celebs who have been known to rub shoulders (and more) with Rob Kearney and Baz-something (she’s the same person). Nasty tabloid rumours have been circulated that his job working with disabled children is just so he can use this to talk women into bed. However, all of the other Giants know this is the one area of his life where he is genuine. They also know that his reason for switching from Giants soccer to South Dublin Swans Aussie Rules is due to the short sleeve guernseys, “Sun’s out, guns out”.

Trivia: Declan was interviewed by the Sunday World before the ARFLI Grand Final this year where renowned sports journalist Roy Curtis-author of Richie McCaw’s “The Black Crow”; pulled no punches when it came to Coynes off the field incidents, mainly ‘BouncerEarFlicking-Gate outside Coppers’ and ‘What can you get done in the length of time it takes to play a game and a half of Pro Evo’. Curtis also questioned him on his less than impressive goal-scoring rate while a member of the Giants. “I don’t score goals, I score girls’ was Coynes predictable response before launching into a tone-deaf rendition of ‘It’s Business Time’ by Flight of the Conchords.

Barry Murphy: Another Giant remaining true to the cause, his defensive partnership with Coffey only conceding an average of 5 goals a game making the Giants a true force to be reckoned with. His willingness to shoot on sight over the past two games yielded a plethora of goals (one) and infuriated his team-mates making Murphy a vital part of this team. Some say he’s got it all, size (5’7” 160lbs), speed (18 sec-100m), and a nose for goal. Took the ‘10-‘11 season of the Giants off due to career-threatening (laser-eye) surgery, however, being the fighter he is he has battled back to reclaim his starting spot this year. Also, the Giants were stuck for numbers.

Trivia: Currently parking aeroplanes in Shannon airport, had a disastrous moment last week when he misplaced his hi-vis yellow jacket and table tennis bats registering him unable to work.

Martin Hanley: Won joint player of the season with Padraig Moran in 08-09 and also finished runner up to the infamous Troy Nathan in ‘Galways most desireable sportsman 2009’. At the awards ceremony in Halo nightclub which was attended by Galways bright young things including Jay O’ Shea and Mark ‘Mindless Violence’ Hanly, a drunken Hanley wobbled onstage, grabbed the microphone from Sile Seoige and told the audience that if Nathan could come over here and steal Hanleys spotlight then Hanley could do the same to him. It is now common knowledge that Martin had earlier been in attendance at a card game in 15 Forster Court and ended up ‘On the bus’. This may explain his tired and emotional state that infamous night. Following through on his threat to Nathan, Hanley jetted off to the southern hemisphere and after months of living the playboy lifestyle and generally trying to outdo Troy, he mentioned to a lady in conversation “WhereyafromWhereyafromWhereyafrom. I’m much hotter than that Troy Nathan fellow of yours aren’t I??” She responded with “Stone the flaming crows. You’re in Australia mate, Nathan’s a bloody Kiwi. Streuth” Sheepishly, Hanley returned home.

Trivia: Affectionately known as Benjamin, Hanley is now residing in Ballsbridge and is a regular and recognisable face on the Dublin social scene due to his fondness for tight and white. Made an unwanted appearance in the gossip ‘mags’ one night when he applied three different types of hair gel and the concoction ended up curdling in his hair, making his dark mane look slightly strange. More magazine went with ‘Benjamins disastrous dandruff dilemma’.

Mike Cawley: Another Giant forced into emigration due to the current financial climate, Cawley appeared angrier than most and pushed for a Greek style protest in the months before his departure. Unable to get the backing of enough people to storm Sligos financial centre, Cawley enjoyed one last race week in Galway-and spent a considerable amount of time under the stairs in 15 Forster Court- before hopping on a plane for Melbourne shouting ‘Burn the f**king bond-holders’ to anyone within earshot. It was on the last leg of his flight from Abu Dhabi to Melbourne that Cawley began his friendship with Danny Cipriani who was on his way to his new team in Melbourne. Rumour has it that he has teamed up with Cipriani causing havoc in Melbourne night-spots. Cawley causes a diversion-usually claiming some girl has lost her bindy-and while the bouncers backs are turned, Cipriani leans over the bar and swipes several bottles of vodka. Apparently next summer the terrible twosome are going to bring this act to Galway and then proceed to go ‘bushing’ at the Spanish Arch afterwards.

Trivia: While on his travels Cawley gave up shaving and grew a very impressive beard drawing comparisons with Leo Moran from the Saw Doctors. Quite often he was mistaken as the Galway musician and went along with it ‘for the craic’ resulting in hilarious consequences, especially when someone produced a guitar. Cawley-posing as Moran-pretended he was shy when apart from the rest of the band and would only play a version of ‘My Lovely Horse’ from Father Ted. This kept the fans happy in most cases except for two Bolivian fans of the Saw Doctors who had never heard of Father Ted. They ripped off their Feile ’92 t-shirts vowing never to listen to the Saw Doctors again.

Mike Brett: The third remaining original member of the Galway Giants Lord Brett is the financial backer of the team i.e. the only one with enough room on his credit card to pay the registration fee. Even Lords are being mindful of the current economic climate though as Lord Brett was the instigator of the Giants-Astro.ie lockout in early September. After Brett threatened the league organisers with ten weeks of hard labour they caved into his demands and let the Giants in for a nominal fee. Over the previous years he has substantially increased his manor in Clos Ard (he added a downstairs toilet) and purchased a fancy car with rumours doing the rounds that he has employed Jimmy Norman as his midweek driver.

Trivia: A renowned lover of the finer things in life such as sexy cars, fast women, fine scotch and cigars, Brett also has a keen eye for business. Got involved in a risky venture in near his hometown trying to grow some vines and produce a Cabernet Sligo. This venture failed miserably though considering Sligo gets as many hours of sun per year as the south of France gets in a day. This led Brett to invest his money solely in antique furniture in the future where he has a reputation as having an eye for a bargain.

Enda Thornton: Captain Flick. The Flickmeister. Call him what you will, he’ll ignore you and continue to flick all day long. His motto being “Sure, it might come off sometime”. Thornton got married earlier this year becoming the first Giant to do so. Got in trouble with his wife on their wedding day by trying to flick the ring onto her finger which had disastrous consequences-the ring rolled under the altar and the wedding was delayed for 20 minutes while everyone searched to recover it. However this has not diminished his fondness of flicking. Making an appearance for the Midwest Magpies in September, Thornton set a record for flicks per game of 2,366, beating the previous record of three set by Barry Hall in 2005.

Trivia: Enda was initially thought to be a true Giant and return for the new season, however, in his own words he had “second thoughts about the price because he got a cold last year”. This outrageous statement has only further added to Thorntons reputation as being the Giants version of Balotelli. That and he likes to throw darts at people after a few drinks.

Padraig Moran: Joint player of the season with Hanley in ’08-’09 the Kilconly man caused trouble for every defence in the league ending up as top goalscorer. The following season though he concentrated on his hometown club under pressure not to be playing that ‘foreign sport’ and only made a few appearances showing glimpses of his undoubted class. Has since moved to Dublin but returns home for club games during the year. Earlier this year in a pre-season friendly against Kilmaine it was widely wondered how he’d react coming up against former teammates Murphy and Shaughnessy. It proved to be a bit of a damp squib as Murphy sat on the bench for the full game only moving to act as waterboy, but what a waterboy. Shaughnessy however was another matter. As the ball was thrown in Moran made a bee-line for Shaughnessy akin to Roy Keane-Marc Overmars in 2001. Moran launched himself into a sliding tackle when the ball wasn’t even within 25 yards and took Shaughnessy out. The hometown referee agreed with Moran when he said that he slipped and no action was taken. Shaughnessy was so rattled that it took two full emergency cans of Coca Cola before he felt right again. Moran 1, Shaughnessy 0.

Trivia: Padraig was involved in Kilconlys foray into the world of Celebrity Banisteoir where Breffni Morgan of The Apprentice fame took control of the club. Unimpressed by Morgan, Moran showed little respect for his Banisteoir until that fateful day in week three when arriving early to training he saw Morgan setting up the cones for shuttle runs listening to ABBAs greatest hits on his iPod. A secret fan since his teens, Moran enjoyed a discussion about the ‘good old days of pop music’ and the two went from strength to strength. Unfortunately Kilconly didn’t win the competition but the two remain close friends.