Is there a world where sports don’t really matter? Are there people who really and genuinely don’t know a sliotar from a rugby ball or who have never heard of Messi, Mayo footballers winning their first All-Ireland in 75 years or Limerick hurlers hammering everybody again? Is there a person in Ireland who hasn’t noticed the growing despair in Cork as they fail yet again, for the 21st year in a row, to lift the Liam McCarthy Cup or a man, woman or child who hasn’t heard the name David Clifford? If there is, I certainly have never met them.

Of course there’s life without sport. People have all kinds of different interests, many having nothing to do with sport but what that life is like is definitely beyond my comprehension. No, we’re not faulting it in any way and life could possibly be a roller-coaster of enjoyment without ever watching a sports event, reading about sport or even the extreme, taking part in any kind of sport. But that life is not for us sports fanatics.

What exactly is a sports’ fanatic? Is it somebody who can’t survive a single day without some contact with sport in some form or a person who would travel to the ends of Ireland to watch Cork footballers, hail, rain or shine? Is it somebody, male, female, or everything in between, who sits in front of television all day, a couch potato, watching all kinds of sports or somebody who borrows to the hilt in the Credit Union to follow Irish rugby or soccer teams, with little hope of ever winning anything, to all corners of the globe for exorbitant ticket prices, astronomical hotel prices and huge travelling costs? Maybe it’s somebody like us who pays an extortionist amount to Sky every month to watch all sports as well as to GAA GO for Gaelic games and to Clubber. And all that on a pensioners’ salary.

Those with no interest in sport have one big advantage over the sports’ fanatics, they will never have to suffer the dreaded disease known as withdrawal symptoms. Over the past couple of weeks, we’ve had the All-Ireland senior hurling and football finals, the world cup soccer finals, (seriously, 6-4 for England, come on!), the rugby nations league (are we playing the same game as the All-Blacks?), the British Open in golf (sadly the last major of the year), Wimbledon tennis finals, top class entertainment all. Now this week? Nothing, zilch, and the dreaded withdrawal symptoms take over. We’ve known people who have withdrawn to darkened rooms, pulled the curtains, isolated themselves from society as they recover. Maybe that’s what we should all be doing now in the heatwave, but even that is in danger of disappearing now, too. I wonder what kind of withdrawal symptoms sun worshippers have when our usual Irish weather of grey skies and rain comes back?

Imagine how the Cork hurling supporters felt when they woke up the morning after the semi-final hammering by Galway, realizing there would be no All-Ireland final this year and no more Cork hurlers until 2027? There were a lot of darkened rooms that Monday. Or those soccer die-hards who stayed up all hours of the night to watch every match in the world cup and then it was all over, TV screens blank, all the teams gone home and only Spaniards left to rejoice. That empty, hollow feeling inside that tomorrow is another day but not with the optimism that Scarlett O’Hara said it in Gone with the Wind. For the die-hard sports fan, tomorrow is just blank and empty.

Ah, sure we nearly forgot. Ignore all the above about withdrawal, the GAA club championships here in Cork began last weekend and will be full blast, week after week, from now to the end of October. Put away the red T-shirt until next year, replace it with the green and red one, of Clon, not Mayo. Guaranteed excitement, not too much travelling, the honour of the little village and parish. The big question is, what will we do from Monday to Friday each week? All suggestions gratefully received.

But we just can’t let the intercounty scene go without referring to the miracle that happened in Croke Park last Sunday in front of 80,000 football fans and almost another million on live television. Mayo won the All-Ireland. How we’ve all suffered with them over the last fifteen years as they tried might and main to break a curse that had stretched to 75 long years and when least expected, they grabbed Sam with both hands. The final whistle brought chaos, delight, tears, pandemonium in green and red.

One veteran supporter shown live on tv, on his knees, tears streaming down his face, thanking God he had lived to see the day. It is surely the greatest GAA story in living memory. France and Spain might be on fire but Mayo will be in grave danger of going up in the flames of bonfires for the next month. What a brilliant end to a great football championship. Now we know why we’re sport fanatics.

And note this well, Cork will win the hurling next year because during the winter we will discover the hunger, the desire, the hard work, the determination and the great new young talent needed to bring the Liam McCarthy Cup back to the banks of my own lovely Lee for the first time in twenty-two years. If Mayo can do it, why not Cork? Remember, you read it here first, in the Southern Star.

Colm Tobin is back from holidays next week