Punditry
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In 2013, Sligo's Gaelic football team encountered a notable setback in the Connacht Championship. During a national television appearance, former team member O'Hara voiced his dissatisfaction with the team's performance and publicly called for the resignation of the team's manager at the time, Kevin Walsh. The team's campaign in the championship commenced with a match against London, which resulted in a defeat for Sligo. This loss had historic implications as it marked London's first Connacht Championship victory since 1977, only the second such victory in their history.
While O'Hara expressed his concerns on live television, the broader sports coverage predominantly focused on other significant matches of the day. Most notably, the reigning All-Ireland Champions, Donegal, convincingly triumphed over Tyrone in a high-profile encounter. Pat Spillane, a well-known sports analyst, shared the studio with O'Hara and expressed his surprise at the tumultuous state of affairs within the Sligo county team, highlighting the unexpected contrast with the traditionally strong footballing county of Kerry.
There are a lot of problems within the county board from the top down. There is a lot of infighting and a lot of resignations at county board level. We have a centre of excellence that is at a standstill. The keys should be handed over on 1 June and that is not going to happen. There are a lot of problems there and Kevin Walsh's results over the last two years have gone unnoticed because of this infighting. He hasn't been held accountable to this. We got to a Connacht final last year but we're papering over the cracks. There are players there that deserve better quality of training and management and I think going forward Kevin should make the right decision for the sake of Sligo football and not anybody else. [13]
Then O'Hara called Walsh "crazy." [13] [14]
Kevin Walsh came at the start of the year and he decided that he wanted full commitment from everybody from 1 November. He was asking players for commitment and a big commitment at that stage but he hadn't accepted the Sligo manager role at that stage. There were reports he had shown interest in the Roscommon job and he was waiting for that to come through, in terms of would he get it, or would he get an interview. For me, he was asking me at 37 years of age to commit to a training regime of four nights a week collective sessions on 1 November, it was crazy as far as I was concerned. Unfortunately work and everything else conspired against me committing to that and I said I would be available from 1 January. [...] Kevin Walsh made big calls this year and last year. Every one of them has come back to backfire against him. For me I think he lost the players throughout the year. [...] But they deserve better training sessions. They deserve better quality in terms of tactical awareness and stuff like that and that hasn't come. Kevin Walsh has a lot to answer for. [13]
Former Armagh footballer Oisín McConville said O'Hara was out of line with his outburst and pointed out that most teams, apart from those to have played in that year's All-Ireland final, go back training in November. [15] [16] [17] Following defeat to Derry in the next game and elimination from the Championship, Walsh resigned as Sligo boss. [18]
