There were obviously old wives’ tales about curses or something of the sort pertaining to the All Ireland victories of both Clare and Dublin and Dublin in 1995. Reason being that both winning captains – Anthony Daly and John O’Leary – made reference to the ghosts of the Biddys – Earley and Mulligan – being put to rest by their respective triumphs.
From the perspective of the Banner County however, they must be beginning to believe each All Ireland win puts a hex on their prospects of getting another one anytime soon in its aftermath. Think about it – whatever Biddy is supposed to have done, they did go from 1927 to ’95 without seeing Liam Mac Carthy.
Then, at their first attempt at defending their possession of same, they were undone by the greatest point the one seeing eye here has ever countered in a hurling match. When Limerick’s Ciaran Carey displayed the balance of a slalom skier, the ball control of Lionel Messi and the sheer will of Mick Galwey when Gaillimh crossed the whitewash in Lansdowne Road with seemingly the whole of England on his back.
A year after that again, the first year of the ‘Back Door’ system in hurling – which would follow in football four years thereafter – with Clare having already beaten Tipperary in the Munster Final with a late David Forde goal – they made no secret of the fact that they had no intention of allowing a team they had already beaten to derail their All Ireland ambitions.
Though they very nearly did so. In one of the great All Ireland hurling final finishes. When a mesmeric save from Davy Fitzgerald denied the great John Leahy what would absolutely have won the match for Tipp. On such inches does fate swing.
From Davy’s resulting puc out, he found Jamesie O’Connor in the shadows of the (old) Hogan Stand and from there the brother of the journalistic goalkeeper essayed one of the great All Ireland winning scores.
Yet again though, in 1998, Clare’s fate added credence to Con Houlihan’s observation that those whom the Gods seek to destroy, they first make mad.
Because, after Anthony Daly had reminded all and sundry that Clare were “No longer the whipping boys of Munster” he and his colleagues were well on top of Offaly in the semi final when fate intervened and kicked the Banner in the ar*e.
Through an honest mistake which could have happened to Our Lord himself, the late Jimmy Cooney blew for full time a few minutes ahead of schedule.
Whereupon, as they were well entitled to in the circumstances, disillusioned Offaly supporters took to the pitch in protest. Now, instead of clearing the pitch and playing whatever amount of minutes were outstanding there and then, the GAA, as they did back then, saw a cash cow and milked it.
By way of ordering a replaying of the entire fixture. Which at the time meant that Ger Loughnane’s team had to field without the considerable influence of Colin Lynch who had been given a ridiculously harsh three month suspension which undoubtedly did Clare out of three All Irelands in five years.
So to 2013, when Davy Fitz, now their manager, stormed the Championship with a new look team whose brilliance culminated in them eventually bypassing Cork after two of the great All Ireland final encounters.
However, even that unexpected triumph didn’t come without a sting in the tale for the yellow and blue as both scorer-in-chief Colin Ryan and mercurial but highly misfortunate forward Darach Honan called time on their respective inter county careers.
Then, as has tended to happen with Davy after a while in the job, the wheels began to come off the wagon a bit. But even that isn’t entirely true as his charges did win the National League Div. 1 title in 2014. Be that as it may, the man from Sixmilebridge was eventually replaced by he who, most unfortunately, has become something of a nemesis for the for the former custodian.
The greatest pity about Davy and (Brian) Lohan having such long marinated beef is that without the incalculable contributions of either or both, the remarkable GAA faithful of the Banner wouldn’t have had their many glorious days over the past three decades.
Up to and including 2024 when the greatest full back the one seeing eye here happened upon in the small ball code ironically emulated his former team mate by bringing a ‘new’ Clare ensemble to the sport’s greatest day and going home with the loot.
By that stage, Tony Kelly and Shane O’Donnell had become fulcrums of operations while Adam Hogan, Mark Rodgers and Aidan McCarthy were representative of the new breed which it was felt would maintain Lohan’s lads as force to be reckoned with for years to come.
Indeed, that may still turn out to be the case, even in spite of last week’s reversal against Limerick. They did, after all, attain promotion back to Div. 1 proper of the NHL.
However, the ghosts of the past weren’t far behind them. First off, for reasons that were never truly explained, you had Aidan McCarthy mysteriously leaving the setup, then, in more recent times, there was Shane O’Donnell’s long goodbye and then, in the actual match itself, Peter Duggan and his colleagues were actually penalised by the awarding of a spot shot.
That might seem odd in view of the fact that Tony Kelly rattled the net with said strike, but allow me to explain. Duggan’s goal attempt had already found its destination. Thus, the correct call for referee Thomas Walsh to make would’ve been to allow the goal to stand and issue a black card to Nickie Quaid.
In contrast, by going back for the penalty and leaving the Limerick custodian on, there was the potential for Clare to be double penalised from Duggan being fouled instead of attaining redress from same. As in, not only should the Treaty stopper have been off the pitch, there was also the possibility – however unlikely – that the Ballyea magician could’ve missed from the spot.
In the end, it was the former of those two-pronged considerations that came back to bite the Banner boys in the butt. Never more so than when Quaid beat away a piece of instinctual ingenuity from Duggan who drew first time on a loose ball with a shot that wouldn’t have been out of place at Wimbledon. One which I would wager shillings to Spice Bags no other in the country would have averted.
The thing is, though, the frenetic finish somewhat masked the reality that – for two of the best teams at playing the best game in the world – it was a match which was uncharacteristically error strewn. Best evidenced by the fact that, despite hitting 1-21 in their eventual victory, it is not stretching reality to suggest they left that combined number of scores behind them for the seagulls.
Now, there are two ways of looking at that. On one hand, there’s the realisation that – had they connected with even half of them Clare would’ve been beaten out the gate. On the other, if the blue and gold themselves hadn’t been equally as profligate in front of goal as their opponents, they might have been in a position to take advantage of their errant ways.
For those vanquished on this occasion, whether desired or not, the conversation will probably naturally stray into whether Brian will remain patrolling the sideline in his own unique, excitable way. Naturally, as a neutral and massive admirer of the flame-haired force of nature, hope in this corner would be that he will.
For several reasons. One – even during what could be classed as an underachieving season for those whom he led to the ultimate prize just two years back, they still attained promotion to Div. 1 proper of the National Hurling League. And, more significantly, with the county having recently won All Ireland Minor and U-20 titles, there’s no doubt there’s an abundance of young talent coming off the production line down Shannonside.
The beginnings of it can even be seen manifesting through the emergence of players like Daire Lohan, Niall O’Farrell, Diarmuid Stritch and Sean Rynne. Add to that others like Eoghan Gunning, James and Fred Hegarty, Jamie Moylan, Paul Rodgers, Thomas O’Connor and, in particular, Michael Collins, and therein lies a playing pool of which most if not all of the country would be justifiably envious.
So what of Limerick as they face into Galway, against whom their astounding run began eight years ago? Well, it’s not a bad recommendation for any team when they hit 1-21 and they can still be said to have been nowhere near their best. John Kiely would be the first to admit the latter part of that himself.
You suspect he wouldn’t even have to. Because, when teams reach levels of greatness which this Limerick outfit did a long time ago, standards and everything else are very much player driven. It recalls the Brian Cody mantra which brought such voluminous joy to Kilkenny for so many years – Honesty of effort and integrity.
Or, to use another, slightly obscure but no less pertinent example, within the Meath group of 1986-1991 (in particular), if a player had an ailment which casts a shadow over their possible participation in a day on the battlefield, the litmus test of their readiness was a short, sharp session up against the Lyons brothers, their cousin Mr Harnan and the Doc McEntee. If you could survive that, nothing was impossible!
Anotxxxxher good indicator that a team has gone to that nth degree that only the true greats get to is that when one of the cogs of the machine is under strain on a given day, the others just recalibrate and combine to fill the void left by their colleague being under par.
Most recently, that played out as Gearoid Hegarty being a very obvious and deserving winner of the Man Of The Match award. Even though the mighty wing forward didn’t score.
Such was his impact though, that those around him benefitted from his brilliance in the guise of Aidan O’Connor and Peter Casey and Cathal O’Neill and Diarmaid Byrnes and Barry Nash taking up the scoring responsability.
And, when somebody is superstitious as yours truly, Nash galloping forward and pointing has become synonymous with the Limerick success story.
Galway have been forewarned, but dealing with something even if you do know it’s coming can be a different thing altogether.
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