Hooked on the handball hellbox

Cavanman's Diary

Last Wednesday, I spoke to Catriona Casey, the brilliant Cork handballer, ahead of a trip to Biarritz in the south of France for a handball tournament.

Well, to be exact, it’s not exactly handball as we know it – this was ‘frontball’, which is an off-shoot of the Basque game of pelota and is played around the world, with a different ball and rules but essentially the same guiding principles – one bounce, return it to the wall.

There are many different forms of handball but the secret of all the variations is the same and can be distilled into one quote I once heard from a wizened American: Hit it where he (or in this case, she) ain’t. Do that and you won’t go far wrong.

There were players from 33 countries at this event - handballers from places like Chile and Cuba, the UK, Italy, America and Mexico. The GAA even sent over a delegation to observe it and meet the organisers; Croke Park have taken a belated interest in handball and see it as a potential way to grow its brand internationally and in inner cities. Frontball could be the route to this.

We’ve been hearing, though, about handball making the Olympic Games for decades now. I hope it happens but there was a sense – when we are talking about the south of France - of Déjà vu when a high-ranking GAA official told me a few months back in an interview that this was the plan.

Now, some of you will probably feel you are experiencing Déjà vu as you read another handballcentric column on this page. It is one of these French phrases which has passed into common usage in English, even though we might not know exactly what they mean, much like Del Boy’s pot pourri and fromage frais for “I don’t believe it” in Only Fools and Horses.

There’s another, lesser-known French saying which lingers lightly on my memory from school days and that is J’amais vu, which essentially means the opposite. It occurs when a situation seems strange and novel, even though you know that it’s quite normal.

In the last couple of weeks, I’ve been back in the handball alley myself and I’ve had this feeling. It’s a funny thing; you play the game for so long that it becomes part of your identity but when you take a break, it still feels weird being back in there.

I should explain to the uninitiated that when I say I’ve been “back” in the handball alley, there are three different court sizes in the sport. One is the One-Wall, which does exactly what it says on the tin.

Then there is my personal favourite, the 60x30, essentially the old outdoor stone courts with a light roof over them. They are in Virginia, Kilnaleck, Mullahoran and Kingscourt. We call this version of the game ‘big alley’.

In this code, played when the air is warm, players have time on the ball, which itself is bigger and softer and cuts through the air beautifully. It feels lovely to strike; there is a half-baked theory that the reason people get hooked on handball is that connecting cleanly on the ball with your hand sends some sort of pleasant sensory message to the brain and this is never more evident than in the big alley.

And then, there is the other game – 40x20 handball, recently rebranded, confusingly, as ‘4-wall’.

‘Small alley’, as its known, originated in America and arrived in Ireland around 1970. It soon began to take off and eventually it became the dominant form of the game. Why? Well, it was novel and thus courts, by definition, were new; throw in the fact that there was a strong international dimension and the opportunity to travel overseas playing the game and it’s easy to see why 40x20 surpassed other forms of the game in terms of popularity.

As this point, to adopt some politicians’ terminology, let me be very clear that 40x20 handball is a torturous pursuit. I should also point out that I am hopelessly addicted to it, which leads me to conclude that all handball players are masochists.

40x20 is a winter game, mainly. It begins around October and runs through till April or so. The ball is small, hard and fast. If you don’t hit it properly, you end up with dark bone bruises on your palms; sometimes, these bruises are so severe that they permeate right through to the back of the hand, too.

Because the court area is smaller, especially in doubles, there is a much greater chance of getting hit with the ball – in fact, at times, again particularly in doubles, it is encouraged. “If you are getting hit with the ball, you are in the right place,” is a mantra I often heard repeated.

But the 40x20 ball is hard. Invariably, that is the reaction of Gentiles when I show them the little blue ball. When it hits you, it leaves a perfect, circular bright scarlet welt; in a few days, the redness will fade and be replaced by a deep purple and yellow bruise.

And then you have the heat. When I was growing up, you would put on layers when entering a handball alley. Now, in the best facilities like Kingscourt, playing handball is akin to hot yoga. It’s a hellbox.

I also find it hard to describe how much sweat is lost in a long match; suffice to say, a player of average fitness probably changes his shirt three times. The larger gentleman may go through a full wardrobe.

“Ah,” sadists will say, “but it’s a great work-out.” And yes, undoubtedly, that is true, in the same way that it’s accurate to state that some poor convict in a chain gang, doing hard time, would have burned calories. Only the real sickos would volunteer for it, though.

I remember once playing a particularly long rally in a warm court with James Brady, whose fitness and tolerance for pain have always been leagues beyond my own. Exhausted, I leaned against the glass back wall, gasping for breath as James skipped lightly past me to pick up the ball, ready to serve again.

Spotting my discomfort, he said, “Come on! This will be worth it when we win the All-Ireland.”

I thought about it for a minute before coming to what I felt was the not-unreasonable conclusion that, well, no, it wasn’t. Which probably explains why James has enjoyed vastly more success than me.

Anyway, the rise in temperature, combined with the ball being lighter than it used to be has made 40x20 handball a game suited to supremely fit athletes. Rallies are more intense, the ball moves faster than in other forms of handball. It’s constant motion, twisting and turning. It is very gruelling, a totally different challenge to the more leisurely, traditional 60x30 game. I find it gets harder every year.

So, at the end of each summer, I decide I might not bother with the 40x20. “Too hard on the joints,” I’ll proclaim at some stage, to someone or other. I found myself announcing it again a month or so ago. That’s right, I told one of the lads, my plan was to just do a bit of running or something when the evenings get short, skip the 40x20 season entirely. Give the shoulder a rest.

(I forgot to mention that 25 years of playing 40x20 handball, with my flawed technique, has left my right shoulder permanently stiff. I try stretching it out but it’s like a wrung nut; no amount of lubrication or hoking and poking make any difference.)

But then, autumn come around and another addict mentions going for a game. “Time to get back into the small alley,” they’ll say.

Just like that, my recovery will be shattered. I’ll reluctantly go along and experience the agony again - the stitch in my side which is veering on a full tear, the sheer exhaustion and dehydration, the pains, everywhere.

And by the end of it, I will be arranging another game for a few days later.

This year, out of sheer cruelty, the Cavan handball committee have instigated a Winter League, which makes things worse. Where once, we could suffer in silence, now the torture sessions are co-ordinated, the results publicised.

As I write, I’m in the office on a Tuesday morning. I should have finished this column last night but I went to Munterconnaught to play 40x20. My elbow is throbbing, my legs are a dead weight. There's a soreness running up my back. I’ve a slight headache and my hypochondria is enflamed.

I’d love to rest for a week but tomorrow night, in the league, I play Joe Dillon, a simply ferocious athlete and a class player, 10 years my junior. More torment beckons – and yet some sick part of me is looking forward to being pounded into submission in 25-degree heat around court 3 in Kingscourt.

Am I well in the head? As I type, my shoulder, bashed into oblivion, is pulsing. If it could talk right now, I know what it would say. Plus jamais, s’il vous plait. Never again!

Not till tomorrow, at any rate...