Many of us will have been there and, if we haven't, we will recognise the scenario.
The corner-forward substitution.
A team in bother, a manager desperate to make some changes, and the corner-forward gets called ashore.
The midfield is out of it, the defence getting the run-around but it's the corner-forward that gets the curly finger.
It's the classic example of taking the easy option.
This week, the GAA found out its position on Team Ireland in its match against Covid-19 ... Number 15.
Last name on the team sheet, first off it.
Like many a proud forward would, the GAA have made their displeasure known.
Instead of the classic, grumpy head and firing of gloves into the dugout, the GAA has demanded evidence for the decision to ban supporters from games and impose restrictions of 15 people at outdoor gatherings.
The combined effect of these decisions will effectively kill off the GAA season.
County football training, where only 15 people can be in attendance?
By the time the back-room team is allowed in, that'll leave about one player on the pitch. For me, it's a non-runner.
Just a short time ago, we were getting used to a weekly relaxation of the guidelines with things only heading in one direction.
Even in the reluctant acceptance of the 200 people attendance cap, there was the assumption that within several weeks we would be up to a thousand and by the time county came around, several thousand would likely be ok.
These changes themselves were a sudden change given that, only a further month prior, we were facing up to a reality of the complete loss of the GAA season.
In this column several weeks ago, I described it as being in the back seat of a car driven by an erratic driver.
Well, Tuesday's announcement feels like we have hit the brakes and went into a skid which is again heading in only one direction... straight for a big, season-ending boulder.
They say it's the hope that kills us.
Given the past few months, it certainly feels like it.
With club football getting up and going, it's fair to say that everyone, players and communities alike were thoroughly enjoying the action and distraction that sport was affording us.
In the least surprising factoid of the past several weeks, a 50 per cent increase was found in rates of depression and anxiety among young people.
In our communities, the return of competitions and training was a real tonic.
While the surrounding issues about attendance, e-learning and Covid supervisors were undoubtedly strange, the games themselves felt normal, and all the more brilliant because of it.
Better than any other activity we have been permitted recently, the watching or participating in proper sports was a huge boost for many.
To see it likely taken away again is tough.
The absence of any apparent trend identifying the games as an issue makes it even tougher.
The evidence if anything points to the opposite.
Take Killeavy, for example. They suffered a mini-cluster when three players tested positive after sharing a car where one of them unknowingly had infections in his household.
The club responded impressively and collectively.
Within days, all members had undergone testing and, despite training together for several days previous and living in the same community, all tests came back negative.
If anything shows the low risk of transmission involved within our games and the relatively effective controls in place, then this is it.
It also shows the benefit of having a GAA community actively involved and taking responsibility for their actions.
If GAA activity was not up and going, and a positive test was in an area, would the entire membership of a club go and get tested?
Absolutely not.
From the start of the pandemic, the GAA has behaved like goody two shoes, doing everything by the book, playing central roles within their communities during the lockdown and even taking on extra precautions as the Government started relaxing precautions.
Yet when the pressure has come on, they are finding themselves hardest hit by the new restrictions.
Hence the annoyance. We all feel it.
Requesting some form of explanation from those in the decision making lines of power is right and proper.
At the very least, it may reveal avenues to ease concerns or give indications regarding likely longer-term plans.
To me, the restrictions speak of a Government, in the face of rising numbers, needing to be seen to do something.
Unlike shutting down businesses, public transport, schools, pubs or restaurants, sports are an easy, if unfortunate target.
Such actions, while hard to take, are tolerable if part of some semblance of a bigger plan.
We all now know that the virus isn't going anywhere and that lockdowns do not eradicate the disease.
We were happy to stick to scientific logic when it made sense.
But there is a growing public weariness when that science or logic appears absent, and the old normal politics of sound bites and 'be-seen-to-do-something' is back in charge.
For now, we sit like the disgusted corner-forward in the dugout, game apparently over.
After all our diligence, we've been hauled off while others, maybe more culpable but deemed more 'important', continue on.
Just like that corner-forward though a bit of self-reflection never does any harm.
Just how diligent were we about our social distancing, hand and kit sanitising, keeping of attendances or avoidance of car-sharing or indoor spaces?
So maybe we weren't the star pupil we would like to think we were, but at the same stage, I still believe the Government are making a mistake.
For the foreseeable future, it is not about eradicating the Covid risk but instead balancing it against the needs of a country and its population.
In the weighing up of benefit versus risk, the restriction on sport seems inexplicable given the positives it brings to health and communities and its low risk of disease transmission.
In the brief time our games were back, surely they did much more good than harm.
Their new restriction suggests an ongoing lack of any long-term, mature approach to the current crisis.
After six months of dealing with Covid, the time for knee-jerk tokenism should have well and truly passed.
For now, we are back in limbo.
I type this on Wednesday.
As ever with Covid, Friday is a long time away.
Announcements from the NI Executive are due later this week, but it's hard to envisage much good news.
For the moment, throwing a strop in the dugout maybe all the GAA can do.
