Clare vs Cork: All-Ireland Hurling Final 2013

Would not be a big Davey fan but I’m sure he gives a s***!  I love the way he says its not about him and then is last man up to collect Liam – never saw any other manager climb the steps! And run to the Hill. And walk into the banquet with it.  Pillar Caffrey school of humility.  It’s all about you as the song says!
 
But in fairness to the man he has a panel of players there – mostly very young – who would die for him.  And they play lovely hurling too.  20 days ago they were at least 6 points better than Cork and drew.  Today they were equally matched but won by six.  Funny old game.  Delighted for Clare – and Brendan B – horse of a man. They can dominate for the next 5 years if they want it badly enough.

Davy is the future, despite what you may all think.

A visionary figure, complete with teams of dieticians, staticians, XXXologists of varying skills, water carriers,
hurl weighers/carriers, kit-men, the full 9 yards.......Do Clare care tonight.... 

The Clare C/B may be in the hole for big bucks this minute, but that'll be sorted in short.
Rogbee Football is on it's last legs, nationally and at inter-pro level. The Munster bandwagon will buy into Clare, by 2025 we'll shout for their disbandment.

In the maelstrom of the closing minutes (3), he was man and crafty enough to acknowledge a great Clare figure, Darach Honan, whom he calmly allowed warm up, before firing him into the fray...

Every dog has his day, eventually.

Not men but giants!

The Puke wrote:Not men but giants!

Well done Clare and congrats Puke.

Unbelievable game. Cannot praise it enough. Magic in Croke Park.

After 15 years of the Big Three winning Liam McCarthy, it was left to Clare to break their dominance.

The difference in the two teams was that Clare were hungrier for the sliotar. Some Cork players were intimidated by the ferocity of their Clare opponents, the same Cork players were second to a lot of ball, even ball that is was reaching them in their favour. That's testament to Clare. They were not leaving Croke Park without the Liam McCarthy cup.

Davy has been 100% on the money since Cork knocked them out of Munster. He took a risk yesterday not only starting a young man in the biggest game of all but O'Donnell is similar to McGrath and Collins. I always thought if O'Donnell got in, it would be McGrath to make way. There'd be a lot of people on his back if it hadn't worked.

As for Davy the man in the interviews, all the top personalities love him. Ger Loughnane, Anthony Daly, John Mullane, Cyril Farrell, Jamesie O'Connor, Tomas Mulcahy. Davy this and Davy that. They can't get enough. I agree. A rare character. Only the second manager in the history of the GAA to be recognised by his first name on it's own (Micko the other).

Looking to the future, you'd think this is the first of many All-Ireland final appearances for Clare. Cork you couldn't be as confident about them getting back.

Nineteen players in Davy’s living room with Mi Wadi and biscuits...
Monday, September 30, 2013
Yesterday morning in Dublin’s Clyde Court Hotel, Davy Fitzgerald sat down with a handful of journalists to discuss Clare’s triumph. So frank and revealing were his words over those 18 minutes or so, we’ve run the transcript of the interview almost in its entirety.

John Fogarty

Question: What does it feel like this morning?
Davy Fitzgerald: “I suppose it still has not sunk in, but it is one of immense satisfaction. I am still the same. I am still so thrilled for the lads. I didn’t touch a drop (of alcohol) because I just wanted to soak in the atmosphere and just watched the rest of them and to see them the way they were is fantastic because they have had some tough times. In fairness, we won a lot of our matches but the public heaped expectation, which is tough, when we lost games and we expect a lot of ourselves so just to see them the way they were last night was brilliant.”
Q: The team shipped some criticism within the county?
Davy Fitz: “I didn’t understand that. They could see the talent, but we had a talented team in 2009 and we didn’t win anything. Limerick won three U21s in-a-row and did not win anything. The transition is unreal to go from U21 up to senior. Don’t anyone tell me that because you have won U21s that you are going to win senior. The big thing for us was that we were able to have so many U21s in our panel, so that we had control of them and we could what we wanted to do. The style of play that we have adopted in the last year and a half has helped because we did not have that style of play in Clare and we had not won any All-Ireland medals at minor level so I am delighted the way things worked out.”
Q: Clare played a more mixed style yesterday?
Davy Fitz: “It is short when it needs to be short, that is the thing. To be able to do that… I look back at some of yesterday’s game and I was amazed at the way they threw the ball around. We threw the ball around yesterday under pressure and it was unreal but Cork did the same thing, but that is Cork and that is what they are used to.”
Q: Did you personally pay a price for taking heat off your players?
Davy Fitz: “People have their opinion no matter what but that is my job. My job is to make sure that they are protected, that is what I am here for. There are so many young lads but with most of the teams that I am with, I will try and do that. I don’t read the newspapers, I had a look at them this morning, but I don’t read them because I want to stay focused. I have a lad who reads them and if there is anything there that he is not happy with he tells me. I try to stay in my own little bubble and I know that I say stuff but you are trying to deflect attention. The way I look at it is, okay, you can say it, deflect away the attention but stay focused on what has to be done. It doesn’t matter. That is what I do.”
Q: Some of the personal stuff, does it hurt?
Davy Fitz: “I have been told that there have been a few people who have said x, y and z. I can guarantee you that none of them know me or know what I am like. Trust me, I have seen the best managers in the game absolutely devour referees. I would be fairly certain that some of the referees wouldn’t have any time for me. I am fairly certain of that.”
Q: Has that hurt Clare – even yesterday?
Davy Fitz: “It certainly does not help. But what do I do? If I feel strongly about a decision I will argue it and you are trying your best to bite your lip but if you feel strongly about it you are going to say it. I have seen the best do it, I have seen Brian Cody argue unreal. He might not get as animated as me but he is able to get his decision across as well.”
Q: Do you think that is important for a manager?
Davy Fitz: “Some people don’t, I do. I won’t say why I do but let’s just say... I won’t say it because I just know at certain times it does work but if I see something I am not making up stuff. There was two or three frees there (on Saturday), and you didn’t need me (to know it was wrong). You could hear the crowd the way they were. I did not knock the referee after the first one, I didn’t need to do it. Everyone else around the county had their say about it, I am not going to knock the referee the first day or yesterday. My God, we had to work extremely hard to get over the line.”
Q: This makes a change from the heckles in Cusack Park following the defeat to Waterford in February when your style was criticised.
Davy Fitz: “That’s what makes it more satisfying now. It’s funny, you have so many fellas coming out saying they changed Clare hurling. I think it’s ****ing great. I’m looking back six months ago, there wasn’t too many of them saying they had anything to do with Clare hurling. It’s just that I was destroying it. The one thing I’m happy about personally is that I had a belief and I didn’t waiver when it was, trust me, easy to waiver. The difference in waking up this morning and the difference in waking up after the Waterford league game, after the Tipperary league game. I would take things very personally and I would not be in a good spot after we lose them. I go home and I’m not a good person to be around. I take it to heart something wicked and I’d wake up the next morning and as a Clare man I took that massive to heart, them defeats. When you’re getting absolutely slaughtered at the same time it doesn’t help. You don’t want to go down to the shop, you don’t want to go any place. No matter what criticism you’re getting you’re feeling so bad yourself. My whole dream was to see Clare being successful. We had a great team in the 70s that I supported as a young boy. I loved going to watch them guys. That’s what made me love Clare hurling. My only thing was that I wanted to make a difference in Clare if I could and just get Clare to be successful. I would fight on my back if I believe in something. Some people like it, some people don’t. I just have to deal with that. It isn’t easy, you want everyone to like you but it’s not going to work. I’d like to think I have a good heart in me but everyone isn’t going to like you.
Q: Unlike previous defeats, you didn’t go to ground the Monday after the Munster semi-final loss.
Davy Fitz: “I didn’t probably feel as bad after the Cork semi-final would you believe. Everyone was down and I asked the boys to come back to my house which was probably different to any manager...
Q: What was behind that?
Davy Fitz: “I wanted to show them that they’re like my family. I said it to them, people who are special to me come into my front sitting room and sit down and spend time with me. We spent three hours in my front sitting room that night and we had an unbelievable chat. There was no throwing stones. You would not believe it, the whole of my sitting room, I had the forwards at one end and I had the backs and I got them a bit of paper and said, ‘Write down what you think’. Then we talked out the points in the sitting room. I was trying to think to myself afterwards, this is unreal.
Q: How many?
Davy Fitz: “The 19 players that played that day, I brought them to the room.
Q: Didn’t bring any of the others?
Davy Fitz: “No, I just wanted the fellas that were on the field that day to find out... I did it for two reasons, I wanted to find out what was in their heads and I wanted to kill it there and then and get back on the horse and go again. And I wanted them to see how much they meant to me. It was an unreal experience, even for me.
“I remember going down the street and buying the Mi Wadi orange and biscuits and all that and having them on the table when they came in and if Joe O’Connor, our sports scientist, knew I did that he’d be cracking with me.”
Q: All the trigger points come against Cork this year? Relegation final, etc.
Davy Fitz: “I’ll tell you a good one now. About a week before the relegation final I was sitting down at home with my dad (county secretary Pat), the week before it. We had beaten Cork in the Waterford Crystal and in the league and I said, ‘We have the relegation final, we have the Championship, I don’t ****ing think we can win the two of them’. And that’s a fact. And he said to me, ‘I think we need to stay in one (Division 1A),’ he said, ‘and I think we’ll get another chance at the Championship’. That was my feeling myself and that was genuine, even though we could have won the semi-final I felt that if we beat Cork in the relegation (final) they were going to come out like absolute men possessed in the semi-final and I knew it was going to be hard but to win the relegation was a massive thing for us as a team.”
Q: For your long term development as well?
Davy Fitz: “The county went a bit mad. They all went to Limerick, there was a good Clare crowd there that day and I remember Louis Mulqueen said to me afterwards that this lady came down and threw a (match) programme at him and hit him in the face and said you can take your short game and shove it where the sun don’t shine. I was walking down after the interviews and I was getting absolutely dogged. The one thing I kept saying to the lads all year: ‘don’t let that feeling leave you, keep that feeling’. I will keep that feeling with me because that’s what makes me, always grounds me and brings me back. Listen, a pat in the back and a kick in the **** there is nothing in it. I’m the same person today as I was last week. That’s how I look at it.”
Q: Did you come away from the Mi Wadi party feeling it was therapeutic?
Davy Fitz: “I knew it felt good. I don’t know if any year will ever be the same as this year with those guys. Obviously, as a manager you are going to make tough decisions with some lads I dropped earlier in the year. Trust me, there were a few really good lads let go at the start of this year. Lads who didn’t play this year like Conor Cooney, Jonathan Clancy — they have played for years. Fergal Lynch. And I want to say this publicly, Fergal Lynch gets a doing in Clare from supporters that is so unjust and so unfair. They do not realise his value to the Clare team. Fergal Lynch is so, so, so immense. As a leader, the boys adore him. He gets them going when he comes on the team and changes them again. He is a super guy. People are wrong. Fergal Lynch is a special guy and deserves a lot of singling out. As I said for the other two guys, Conor and John, they played for Clare for years, Donal Tuohy they’ve been left on the sideline. And is it hard. Will I keep 37 lads happy? No. I’m sure there are five or six who feel they should be playing but I’m sure every manager in the country accepts that is going to be the way.”
Q: You were the only candidate when you took the job. What does that say to you?
Davy Fitz: “I don’t think people wanted to take on the challenge, they were after being beaten by Galway very convincingly a few years ago. In my view Sparrow (Ger O’Loughlin) had started the process. I believe there was an awful weeding out, our culture in Clare for a while was not good. I believe we didn’t mind ourselves and I said that to the players, I don’t believe we got the best out of ourselves in the mid 2000s. You can’t be a social animal and hope to play well. I think, in fairness, Mike Mac and them and Considine had his time and fair play to them all, I’m not going to knock anyone no matter how I feel. Everyone did their best. Sparrow had the toughest job, Mike Mac did well getting to a Munster final, Sparrow came in and he had to start from scratch.”
Q: You talk of social animals but this is life-changing for a very young team?
Davy Fitz: “They are good lads. We have a code, if I am in charge next year you will stick by the code, you will not break it. We have principles and I would like to think that we will stick by the principles. After the first All-Ireland (game), I will let them out and enjoy themselves for the night. Every now and again, they are allowed to let the hair down as long as they conduct themselves in a proper manner. That is very important to us because they are role models for a lot of kids and I want them to be that way. They are really nice guys and I want to make sure...I’ll keep reminding them of the tough days.”

amazing game and one i'm glad i had the sense to record on the old Sky+ Box so i can watch over and over again.

A great advert for the game of hurling and one which football could take a lesson from. Clare got off to a great start but when Cork reeled them in and got back level i figured Cork were going to get over the line first.

Alas it wasnt to be and the game tilted one way then the other. It was a joy to watch and every player can hold their head up high and know that they gave it their all. I know its no consolation for cork but they did contribute immensely to a wonderful contest and one which will be talked about for years to come.

A few points of note
1) hurling commentators never feel the need to get stuck into players and criticise their every move, take a note football commentators

2) Ollie Moran on the Saturday Game was almost encouraging Cork to adopt a more cynical side to their game - no call for it at all.

3) As the game unfolded and the impact of young O'Donnell was the main talking point a thought occurred to me, fair play to Davy for having the balls to go with the young lad, how long would we have to wait before Mickey Harte would take a similar risk????

4) all this berating of Davy is a tad ridiculous - he has answered his critics in the finest of styles. Personally i cant say he bothers me too much - hes passionate and wears his heart on his sleeve and there is no doubt he has a bunch of lads who would give their all for him

bocerty wrote:4) all this berating of Davy is a tad ridiculous - he has answered his critics in the finest of styles.  Personally i cant say he bothers me too much - hes passionate and wears his heart on his sleeve and there is no doubt he has a bunch of lads who would give their all for him

Diarmuid Lyng summed it up well in his article in todays Indo

Diarmuid Lyng: Davy Fitz's flaws scream at you, but that's his magic

Diarmuid Lyng – 30 September 2013
Bad karma isn't something I would have ever associated with Jimmy Barry-Murphy, but he called it during the week, imploring someone to emulate Walter Walsh's heroics last year and turn the replay on its head.

It turned out to be a call to a 19-year-old from Eire Og, the personification of a new breed of hurler in Clare. They're young, confident, capable and most importantly of all, they've accepted winning as something they're permitted to do.
They aren't waiting to be invited to the top table of hurling. They've arrived, invited or not, in a blaze of blue and gold.
Barry-Murphy's opposite number is a different story. We know so much, the pundits and the people. With the depth of analysis and real-time information that has swept through sport like a wildfire, we are in the know now as soon as it happens.
But some things are kept away from us.
Whether we like it or not, Davy Fitzgerald (pictured) is an enigma. From the outside it looks like chaos. Ego. Blind determination. But inside the Clare dressing- room it's nothing like that. Maybe inside his head it's nothing like that either. It can't be all madness and trench warfare. There's method in there. There's real love in there too. That's how they speak about him.
We can dress it up whatever way we like. But it's clear. It was clear for me talking to Brendan Bugler after the game. "If you'd one thing to say to Davy, Brendan, what would it be?" "I love you," came the reply. Don't feel like you have to squirm. It's real and it's tangible and it's pure.
Brendan is a smart guy. He doesn't follow blindly. The opposite in fact. He's a leader. Off the field as well as on. And that's what he would say to Davy Fitz.
The aristocracy will find his many flaws. In fact, we all will. It's impossible not to. Because they're in your face. They scream at you. Get under your skin. The imperfection of it all. And that, for me, is his magic. Perfectionism is overrated. In fact, it's a curse. The lack of acceptance of things as they are, not as they should be.
Of course, he shouldn't run on to the field. Of course, he shouldn't remonstrate from the sideline. And we'll laugh and jeer when he's told to get back in his box. But the reason he has fulfilled his greatest ambition is that he has no box to get back into. And because he accepted Clare hurlers for what they are, not how much like Kilkenny's prototype they could be.
Be annoyed. Get angry.
He can't be pencilled in to an area of our lives that we are satisfied that we have an understanding and a control over – because he's absolutely pure. That little ... but he is. He's purely himself. There's nothing more pure. Nothing more unique. Nothing more important in a time when we're encouraged to fit in, instead of being courageous enough to stand out. Put it all on the line and say: 'This is who I am and this is what I'm about.'
But, of course, it's not all about Davy Fitz. They're a unique bunch. Shane O'Donnell won't celebrate for the month because he's looking to get back to the club. Patrick Donnellan feels lucky to be part of a great group of guys that are enjoying something they were apparently born to do. They're as modest as they are talented. Little fear for Cork in it all, too.
The Rebels were second best, but they had a solidity that defied their experience. Clare are young. Cork are every bit as young. Clare have dominated national finals under age. Cork are mobilising. They'll be back.
Seamus Harnedy's 60th minute goal could have swung it in their favour. It would have been a coup. But that's the team that's developing. A team with the ability to deal with almost whatever Clare threw at them. There's as much resilience there as there is talent. Just not enough on the day. Just as one superpower flounder, another one steps into the breach.
We can look forward again now. Ponder without fear of getting a beating by a Cat for even thinking about winning. Waterford will raise their head above the parapet for a while longer now. Limerick will spend less time in the trench. Wexford will begin to dream again. The year belongs to Clare. But we're all better off.

You have to hand it to Davey Fitz’s management. He got everything right. Preparation, fitness levels, their mental strength (some achievement considering the youth of the team), tactics (both days), substitutions etc. Shane O’Donnell was a masterstroke.

The only thing that irks me a bit is that despite his ‘protestations’ it is all about Davey. He has dominated proceedings at every opportunity since the final whistle. Cody would give an interview and be gone. Fitz loves the attention – loves it – and any suggestion otherwise on his part is pure rubbish. He should hide away now for a few days and give the players who won Liam their day in the limelight.

How Clare discovered the magic
Saturday, October 05, 2013
Around 7pm last Saturday night, Darach Honan was on the flat of his back on a field in Dublin, looking up at the sky, or what he could see of it above the Croke Park floodlights.

By Michael Moynihan
“Everyone knew it was over. That we’d won the All-Ireland. There were all sorts of emotions — relief, pure joy, the sense of coming off the bench. I had something to prove. It was a mash-up of a lot of emotions.”

He’d just danced down the end line to score the clinching goal in the All-Ireland final replay. Cue the celebration. The emotional trip home.

“Every county wants to win the All-Ireland,” says Syl O’Connor. “But when it actually happens... it’s magic.”

As Clare FM’s commentator, O’Connor’s voice is known all over the Banner, and beyond since his end-of-game commentary went viral, in the parlance of our times.

As a former Clare GAA PRO, he’s closer to the intercounty team than most.

“The most important thing I picked up between the draw and the replay was that the players realised very rapidly that the opportunity wasn’t gone. It was still there.

“They’d played exceptionally well against a very good Cork side — something that people shouldn’t forget by the way: scoring 6-32 in two All-Ireland finals is some going.

“Our lads showed in the opening period of the replay that they were carrying on where they left off in the drawn game.

“The other factor was that they were enjoying it. The build-up to Limerick-Clare was huge, the build-up to the drawn final the same and it was as big for the replay, but they were enjoying it.

“There’s also huge competition for places: there were players taken off last Saturday who’ll certainly be in contention for All Star awards, but it makes no difference. Why? Because they’re enjoying themselves.”

There’s another factor, of course. The manager.

O’Connor spent a few seasons with Davy Fitzgerald as a club selector with Sixmilebridge. “Davy is absolutely meticulous. You could get a phone call from him at any time of the day or night about a plan he has in mind.

“He doesn’t walk into meetings empty-handed. He’ll prepare for them. But he might give the impression when he comes in that he’s got nothing to say.

“What he’ll do is ask you what you have in mind and he’ll debate with you: ‘why did we take off the number seven, why did we move the number 13 out the field’. He’ll discuss that stuff all day with you and take one thing out of the discussion, maybe, to use.” A couple of weeks before Clare and Limerick played in the All-Ireland semi-final, for instance, O’Connor’s phone buzzed with a call from Fitzgerald: “He said to me, ‘have you seen such-and-such a player’ and I said, ‘he’s small but he’s lively, he had a bit of an injury earlier in the year but he’s going well now’.

“That player wasn’t on the Clare senior panel but Fitzy said, ‘I’m thinking of bringing him in during the winter’. The point here is that even while they were preparing for the All-Ireland semi-final, he was still looking around for players for next season. ‘I must get him built up a bit,’ he said to me, ‘there’s something to him.’ That’s Davy — thinking ahead all the time.

“What you see depends a lot on what you look for. There’s a perception that if you stick near him you’ll get a headline, you’ll get something. But it’s not a show. That’s who he is. His passion is near the surface. If you think he’s lively during a match you should see him at training.”

On the bus back to Clare on Sunday evening, O’Connor asked about the pre-match interviews the manager had been giving to RTÉ all summer, sketches in intensity which caused no end of comment. “If they want a show, they’ll have to go to someone else,” Fitzgerald told O’Connor. “They’re the questions I’m asked, those are the answers I have, that’s what I believe in.”

Fr Harry Bohan of Sixmilebridge had a humming phone himself on Tuesday. Fitzgerald had just cited him as an inspiration on RTÉ radio and people were keen to touch base with the cleric as a result.

Few people know the Clare boss better than Fr Harry.

“The bullying he spoke about on the radio, that meant he was alone for a good bit of his childhood, and he could have gone down, but he didn’t — he got the best out of himself.

“Because of that, he’s good with people who are lonely themselves, for whatever reason. Before the final he pointed out to the players that there were plenty of young people who’d love the opportunity to play in Croke Park, the disabled and the sick, and he got into their heads the concept that Croke Park was a great place to be, and that they were lucky to be there to enjoy it.

“I’m doing house calls to elderly people, a lot of them are probably pretty lonely, but I’ve never seen as many of them smiling. It’s given them a huge boost, but it’s taking me at least twice as long as it usually does. They all want to talk through the entire game all over again.

“It’s given the place a huge boost. We haven’t won too many of them here in Clare. It’s easy to say that a very special group of people have won an All-Ireland, because it always takes a very special group to win an All-Ireland. ”

Bohan sees an opportunity in the hurlers’ success. He was on the platform with them in Sixmilebridge and says there wasn’t a hint of drink among them: “At a time when young people need role models, when drugs and drink are doing huge damage to young people, we genuinely believe these lads can be role models. They’ve lived since last Christmas in a non-drink culture, something Davy introduced because he’s like that himself.

“We’ve to pay massive tribute to Cork, and to Jimmy Barry-Murphy in the same way. For the game to be that good, and the graciousness of the man afterwards...

“Everyone here is talking about role models — there’s a role model.”

The panel will do the rounds of the schools, he says, but it won’t just be about dishing out half-days.

“It’s not about bringing the cup to show it off. Celebrating, having a good time, that’s great, but they’re going to bring a message to the schools — that there’s a lot we can achieve if we set our minds to it ourselves. Including creating jobs, which we’ve been doing here in recent years.”

Fr Harry points out that while everyone saw Shane O’Donnell get three goals last Saturday and saw him get mobbed at the GOAL game on Wednesday, people didn’t see him approach his manager with a question.

“He asked Davy, ‘How am I going to cope with this new-found fame? Because I’m going to have to cope with it.’ That was a very mature question. You wouldn’t get it from some 50-year-olds. He was asking Davy for guidance in getting his feet back on the ground, which is a good sign for such a young lad.”

Entering Ennis on Sunday evening, about a 100 yards before they got into the middle of the crowd, Syl O’Connor saw Ger Loughnane and Tony Considine standing on a corner.

“The 1995-7 team had their time, they were all in Croke Park to support the lads, but they were always the type of fellas who’d say, ‘we had our time in the limelight — but it’s the lads’ turn now.’ That’s the type of character they were, and they certainly wouldn’t want to take away any of the limelight from the 2013. ”

One of those players was in Croke Park on Saturday, and he was busy Sunday, but he still got back to Clare for the homecoming. Anthony Daly had Dublin senior hurling championship games to watch but he lit out west soon afterwards.

“I remembered how special it was to come to Clarecastle after games as a player, and I wanted to be there before the team got there. They were delayed on the way out so I made it.”

He and some of the other 1995 players were invited onto the platform — “Sparrow did all the talking,” he says — but it was the 2013 lads’ turn.

“It was great to meet them up on the platform, we (Clarecastle) had three on the training panel and the Ballyea lads are from nearby as well, but it was their time in the sun.

“The young kids were at the front of the stage and when we went up, before the players arrived, they were all saying, ‘ye’re the old team, ye’re the old team’.

“Sure their fathers were getting them to give us papers for autographs and they were obviously thinking, ‘who’s this baldy fella?’”

The current crop themselves were in awe of the scene before them.

“We’ve had underage success,” says Darach Honan. “But nothing like the crowds last weekend... as far as you could see, nothing but Clare people. The flags, the colours, an unbelievable spectacle.”

In his own time the big full-forward was one of the kids looking up at the heroes. The Honan household was rocked by the arguments between a five-year-old who wanted to go to Croke Park in 1995, though he made it to Dublin in 1997: “It inspired me, definitely, to want to do what they did. And you can see what it means to people — what it meant at the final whistle up in Dublin. Looking into the crowd in Croke Park is something that’ll always stay with me, to see them going crazy.”

Daly, ever the thinker on the game, can see the quality of Clare’s forward play this year originating in the changing face of minor hurling in the county.

“There has been very good coaching, that’s improved in recent years.

“After 1997 the county board took its eye off the ball a little and Colin Lynch was a one-man band, trying to coach hurling and football all over Clare on his own. Now you have four hurling coaches, maybe three football coaches, all of them working hard and the clubs all working hard. We (Clarecastle) haven’t won a county since 2005 but we’re back competing, in a minor semi-final and so on.

“One aspect of the improvement is that the likes of Clonlara, Cratloe and Crusheen realised there were opportunities there if they put in the work, and they passed out the clubs in mid-Clare — Clarecastle, Sixmilebridge, Wolfe Tones and so forth. Those clubs were the mainstay of the 1995-7 team and they had to respond to the challenge.

“Amalgamations have also been a huge factor. At minor you have Inagh-Kilnamona in the semis, and they’re no longer a combination, they’re one club while there’s talk that Feakle and Killanena will also become one club.

“A lot of those clubs might have played C or D minor, but by amalgamating, standards have risen. Our minors (Clarecastle) would find it very hard to beat them.

“By standards rising, I mean good players can play in the forwards — there was a time, when these clubs were on their own, that their best players were full or centre-back. Now, with the amalgamations, the good players are allowed to play centre-forward or even corner-forward. And you can see it in the senior team, because 5-16, which they got in the final, wouldn’t be a usual Clare score.

“Also, there’s obviously been a lot of work done with the (senior) team not to play with fear — you saw them bouncing the ball off the ground, Pat Donnellan flicking the ball back over his head. There’s been an encouragement to express yourself, and the improvement in coaching standards has also borne fruit at senior level. ”

Fr Harry isn’t buying into the easy talk that Clare are set to dominate for years to come, though. Neither is Darach Honan.

“Davy’s done a lot of radical things this year,” says Bohan. “But once other teams cop you, that comes to an end and you’re there to be shot down.

“Still, fellas should enjoy the win and live in the moment and not be thinking of next year. Do your best next year and leave it ‘til then.”

Honan says: “We nearly lost the first day, there wouldn’t be much talk of dominating for years if that had happened. The talk of dominating for years doesn’t add up. When Tipp won a few years back, people said that would happen but it didn’t.

“Our attitude beforehand was that we might never again see an All-Ireland final, so we said we’d take the chance when we had it.”

On Sunday, as the team bus finally stopped in the centre of Ennis and the group prepared to meet the crowd gathered to welcome them, O’Connor brought some notes down to Fitzgerald, who was at the back of the bus.

“What do you think of it?” said the manager.

“What we’ve felt over the last two days, you’d love to make it up,” said O’Connor. “Isn’t it great that you don’t have to make it up?”

Quick-draw artists help to restore national treasure

TOMMY CONLON – 06 OCTOBER 2013

It can't always be taken for granted that newly-crowned All-Ireland champions are automatically designated the unofficial title of national champions too.

Especially in hurling where the traditional three-way cartel has often left the championship looking more like a private members' club from which everybody else is excluded.

When Kilkenny were wrapping up title after title over the last 15 years, it was always about them and nobody else. An introverted team would take the cup back to an introverted county and everyone else would get on with their lives. Kilkenny were the Kilkenny champions. They weren't necessarily national champions.

When Loughnane's Clare team of the mid-to-late 1990s kicked the doorsdown, everyone else piled in behind them. No invitations were necessary. Everyone was welcome to the party. We were suddenly all guests of the nation. We could all share in the success and the joy. That mighty Clare team were true national champions. Yes, to use the hackneyed phrase, they were the people's champions.

That feeling came back in a flood last weekend when Davy Fitzgerald's new model army took the cup back to the Banner county once more. We didn't know how much we'd missed it until it had been restored. That happy sense of inclusion was reborn.

Kilkenny's Cody era might never be matched for greatness. But Clare's victory last Saturday was a reminder of how oppressive this greatness was. It was a grim, joyless annual procession based on macho principles of power and ruthlessness. Teams didn't merely have to be beaten, they had to be humiliated where possible. There wasn't much evident aspiration to winning with style; it was more about winning with steel. They were mechanically, morbidly relentless.

The two games served up by Cork and Clare this September had the effect of letting the light back in. Sports fans were palpably buoyed by the contrast in spirit. Kilkenny's heavy-handed physical attrition was replaced by an attitude of openness and innocence. It was almost as if the game itself was allowed breathe again.

Both sides were obviously desperate to win. But even in the stress and tension of an All-Ireland final, players did things that weren't just in the service of winning but were almost expressions of hurling for hurling's sake. There was a sense about them that they weren't just serving their own purposes, but serving their sport too. A tremendous contest for honours, played out over 140 minutes, became a showcase for the game.

Instead of trying to establish physical supremacy first, and letting their hurling ability take over afterwards, it was as if they'd decided to dispense with the bodily smash-and-crash that had been integral, for example, to the epic Tipp-Kilkenny collisions of preceding years.

The draw and replay were like fencing duels, a prolonged joust that would be decided by quicksilver stick skills. Hurleys would be blades rather than bludgeons, both parties freely consenting to the rules of engagement. When the handkerchief dropped, they went to it, thrusting and parrying, lunging and recoiling, scoring freely with rapid-fire nicks, incisions and glancing strokes.

Played on these terms and in this spirit, the diptych duly rained with points and goals. After the first game one side or the other might have decided on a different strategy, given the shellacking they'd suffered as well as inflicted. Enough of the spills and thrills: let's pour some cold water on the entertainment and apply some realpolitik to the business of winning an All-Ireland.

But three weeks after the draw they resumed as if it had only been a momentary break in play; as if they'd no choice in the matter; as if they were entwined in a rotating spiral that kept gravitating higher and higher. When it was over, it was Cork who fell to earth. Clare had overturned 100 years of established custom in this particular relationship.

The Loughnane interregnum had been built on athletic power, formidable personalities and overwhelming force of will. The new generation is almost the polar opposite. They beat Cork because they were basically quicker on the draw. A recurring image from both games is clumps of players stooped over ruck ball on the floor – and then someone in yellow

emerging from the thicket, ball in hand, and scampering into open space. Clare were quicker on their feet, with their hands and in their heads. They hustled Cork players with manic speed; their wits were sharper, their reflexes too.

Cork got into their heads several times and rattled old ghosts in the hope of unnerving Clare, as many a Cork team had done before. But they were dealing with a different model: Clare coped with every setback like they knew deep down they were the better team. No matter what, they were better. Inconceivably, Clare were the more confident team too.

If the Cork management occasionally looked baffled on the sideline, it was perhaps because they were witnessing something that confounded everything a lifetime of tradition had taught them to expect. They weren't the only ones. This Clare team has shattered a lot of preconceptions; they have arrived with a bang – the shock of the new.

The post-match shenanigans were a bit more familiar: the colour and charisma, the music and joy, the unbridled spirit of the county in full bloom. It's the feelgood sports story of the year. And once again, everyone is welcome to the Banner's house of fun.

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Davy Fitzgerald: 'I might as well not be here if I'm not involved in hurling'
Clare boss recalls his life-changing heart scare in 2009 and reveals what it took to bring Clare back to the promised land

Vincent Hogan – 22 October 2013
On the night of the Clare homecoming, Davy Fitzgerald knew that he was looking at different people. He had agreed to step off the bus in Cratloe, where a young man waited in a wheelchair.

The toll of his illness was instantly discernible through the windows on one side of the bus and, as Davy stepped off with the Cup, he was unaware of a supporting delegation.
But maybe nine of his players were out of their seats, following their manager down the steps. Fitzgerald said nothing as he watched them reach out with quiet respect to a stranger for whom the noise and energy of their All-Ireland win had, maybe, offered some fleeting sense of escape.
The clock tends to tyrannise a homecoming schedule, but there was no great haste to escape Cratloe that Monday. Climbing back on board eventually, Davy felt a tingle of affection for his players that flew far beyond a response to the winning or losing of big hurling games.
At that moment, it struck him that glory had a small galaxy of different meanings.
He would slip quietly out of the West County Hotel that evening, making it home to be in his own bed before midnight.
All those wild emotions that flap and swirl around great hurling coronations have never quite engaged him like the journey itself. Drink doesn't interest Fitzgerald and he wasn't now about to stand, sentry-like, observing the relationship others might have with it.
The players were entitled to the space to make mistakes now and he had little doubt that some would take it. But Clare's hurling year had been predicated upon a standard of self-respect that, on his watch at least, will never be compromised.
"I'd be very proud of how they've held themselves and I want them to continue to do that," he says now. "I don't want them to turn into social animals. I'm happy for them to go out, have a few drinks and enjoy themselves, but they know there's a line. Hopefully, they realise that.
"If they don't, it could take me a while to bring them back down to earth. But I will do it. Of course, it's a small worry. Will some of them get ideas about themselves? And, if I go leaving them off next year, will the whole family spirit we have go out the door? Will they start thinking about themselves, with the team no longer being number one?
"I hope not. I hope what we have now doesn't change. Because if it does and if they start focusing on themselves, we're in trouble."
It feels, he says, as if a light has been switched on in the county. Winning an All-Ireland doesn't cure illness or pay any bills, but it can change a community's psyche. The recession has been writing itself across people in stark, black lettering and, sometimes, hope gets swallowed up in a recriminatory din.
Fitzgerald has taken a share of financial blows himself, yet a life-changing episode in '09 persuaded him to turn his back on negativity.
He had been feeling poorly for some time that summer and, shortly after Waterford's All-Ireland semi-final defeat by Kilkenny, reported to the Beacon Hospital in Dublin for an angiogram. Fitzgerald had found himself sweating profusely and experiencing tightness in his chest during Waterford's games.
The angiogram revealed a 95pc blockage in an artery. One week later, Fitzgerald was back in Dublin to have a stent inserted.
"I remember I didn't get a wink of sleep that week with the worry," he remembers. "Listen, it isn't a massive procedure, but it frightened the life out of me to hear of a 95pc blockage. The specialist, Dr Niall Mulvihill, said I was in real heart attack territory at that stage and my family history wouldn't be great in that regard.
"Would I have died if I had a heart attack? I don't know. Should I still be involved in sport at the level I am now? Probably not."
Asked if he has been advised against such involvement, Fitzgerald is remarkably candid. "Well I told him (Dr Mulvihill) straight out that if I wasn't involved in it, I might as well just be dead myself," he reveals. "He's been unbelievable towards me. Like he checks me out thoroughly once a year now. If I have a problem, I can ring him.
"He's a fella who cares about me, but he knows I might as well not be here if I'm not involved in hurling."
So, in an ideal world, he'd prefer you were not manager of Clare?
"I'd say he probably would, yeah!"
For a man of just 42, Davy has had his share of medical scrapes. In 2004, having been taken ill after a National League game against Galway, a 3cm cyst was identified on the wall of his brain. Mercifully, tests revealed the cyst to be benign, but it took three and a half harrowing months for him to get the all-clear.
If hurling frequently devours his concentration now, it will – thus – never blind him to the dramas that truly matter.
Some time ago, he made the decision not to read doom-laden stories in newspapers or watch TV programmes with a negative spin. He tried pulling the shutters down on the toxins of bad news.
"We can't bury our heads in the sand, I know that," he says. "But I think more and more people just feel it doesn't serve anyone well to be listening to that stuff every two seconds. You look at certain political programmes now and all they're doing is looking to tear holes in people.
"To me, the most important thing in life is life. I have a lot of flaws in me that I'd rather not have. It's up to me to deal with them and try to be better. But I wake up most days saying 'This is a good day ... '
"Because any day you wake up healthy is a good day. There are people out there in desperate straits health-wise. Those of us who aren't, I don't think appreciate that enough."
People have long seen Davy as the human equivalent of a bubbling tureen. His sideline eruptions bring him into frequent conflict with referees, and some like to depict this as the irrational flapping of a hysterical bird. They bristle at such volatility. Davy's own view holds that there are those in authority who simply do not like him.
Yet, to people who truly know him, Fitzgerald inspires profound loyalty. Clare captain Pat Donnellan touched on this with his acceptance speech in Croke Park, insisting that, if need be, the players would fight "to the death" for their manager.
They see in him someone who goes to war on their behalf, without ever countenancing a backward step. The glorious belligerence of Clare's hurling, thus, remains a faithful reflection of Davy Fitz's personality.
In the week after the replay victory, an interview on RTE radio with Miriam O'Callaghan hinted at its genesis.
Fitzgerald spoke with remarkable openness about his experience of bullying as a child, his words generating a great tsunami of recognition from listeners. It was as if he had broken some vague code of omerta, a great raft of victims suddenly finding their voices.
The reaction startled and delighted Davy in equal measure.
He reflects now: "Bullying had a massive effect on my life. I always realised that. Like I can remember an All Star do in '98/99 in the Burlington Hotel. I went talking to these two or three lads from a particular county and they were trying to take the piss out of my voice, trying to be funny fellas.
"I can still hear the sniggering and laughing as I walked away and that really hurt. I went back over to them and said 'Ye're funny men, aren't ye?' They just disgusted me. That incident wouldn't have left a great taste in my mouth, because it brought back a lot of what I put up with as a kid. I just don't believe in that kind of behaviour.
"When I go to train teams now or give talks, I make reference to that. I always refer to how you treat people. Maybe people are only listening to me more since we won the All-Ireland, but I've always said this. I do always watch for that in a group now, for the smart guys.
"Like, some people will never accept that their son could be a bully. They'll have their head in the clouds or start jumping up and down, saying it isn't true.
"Listen, I've no problem with having the craic. That's okay, but hurting someone's feelings is not okay. I'm all for having fun. Trust me, the boys take the piss out of me on the team bus, they'll talk to me about 'Gift Grub' and stuff like that.
"They have a bit of fun, but I know it's not to hurt me that they're doing it. I know that. If I thought it was someone being nasty, then they'd see the nasty side of me as well."
That incident in the Burlington lit old, depressing fires in his head.
"It did yeah, without a shadow of a doubt," he says. "It made me angry. Like I just don't buy into that. Why would you make fun of someone? Why would you want to? To me, there's a flaw in your character if that's what you're doing, a weakness even.
"It's like the fella at a game who'd be standing up at the wire, roaring out at me, giving me savage abuse. Like the day of the Laois game this year. It was hardly two minutes in and this lad's screaming 'You've Clare hurling ruined you f***er you!'.
"And I'm saying to myself 'Maybe these guys have issues at home and they feel they've to come to a match and take it out on me'."
The game, he admits, can take irrational swings at his emotions. He tends to be an open book on the line, railing furiously against any perceived injustices inflicted on his team.
Yet, Fitzgerald is an inherent optimist too. His time in Waterford delivered only the ninth Munster title of their history and, in '08, his introductory three months of involvement with them brought the county's first All-Ireland final appearance since 1963.
That they met annihilation by Kilkenny that day left a considerable scar. Fitzgerald was verbally abused on the field afterwards by a pocket of Waterford supporters and when, three summers later, Tipperary knifed seven goals past them in a freakish Munster final, he again found himself in the line of fire.
"That was tough," he acknowledges of the Tipp slaughter. "Two or three people tried to bust in the dressing-room door to have a go at me."
That night, he sat up until 4.30am in Castlemartyr, barely able to speak to a great, trusted friend, Liam O'Dowd. When Liam eventually left for Dublin, Davy went up to his room, knowing sleep would be impossible. So he just sat waiting for the light of dawn to come bleeding from the night sky before getting in his car and driving to Dungarvan for a crisis team meeting.
Two weeks later, Waterford would devour Galway in an All-Ireland quarter-final.
Fitzgerald remains extremely friendly with many of those he soldiered with in Waterford, reflecting: "I know myself we were not a hundred miles away with that team. I mean it's horrendous how you'd feel on days like those, you'd be wrecking your head thinking of things you might have done differently.
"But I met some of the best people anyone could ever meet in Waterford. I have great affection for an awful lot of people still. A number of the players still text me. The texts Stephen Molumphy sends just shows me that I made the right decision in giving him the Waterford captaincy.
"If there was a transfer market in the morning and I was asked players I'd love to have, Stephen Molumphy would be top of my list. I have such a high regard for him, not only as a hurler but as a person. Like, I know we could be playing Waterford tomorrow and he'll fight tooth and nail to beat me.
"But I know too that I can look him in the eye afterwards and there'll still be a connection. He is one of the great guys."
Four days after the All-Ireland final he was sitting in Lahinch Golf Club, his back turned to a TV set as RTE broadcast the draw for the 2014 Championship.
People imagined he might be absorbed by the detail, but his only instinct was to push it away. Four days? It seemed faintly comical that minds should already be recalibrating for next summer. Davy isn't ready yet to become lost again in the labyrinth of paternal worries that shape the life of a county manager.
Clare reached the end of the rainbow quicker than he thought they might and he knows the road ahead is now heavily mined.
It seems only weeks since he was asking Louis Mulqueen and Mike Deegan to climb aboard or sitting in the Limerick Radisson with Paul Kinnerck, teasing out systems. When Fitzgerald gets talking about his management team, he becomes effusive.
He mentions the sports science of Joe O'Connor "a guy ahead of his time", the sports psychology skills of goalkeeping coach Seoirse Bulfin. He finds it funny that people suspect an antipathy towards referees when three of his back-room team, Seanie McMahon, Fergie McDonagh and Tom Stackpoole, are of that very caste.
He mentions 'Gazzy', Michael Collins the kit-man, and 'Hego', Tommy Hegarty, who looks after the hurleys. Then he stops himself, fearful of upsetting anyone by omission.
Then, under prompting, Davy mentions his father. Pat Fitzgerald has been county secretary now for three of the four senior All-Ireland victories in Clare's history. A quiet, undemonstrative man, he faced the spite of some lazy minds when his son became Clare manager.
"The job he does is incredible," says Davy Fitz. "But we have been fodder since I went in, both of us in a no-win situation. I don't think he gets the respect or credit that he deserves. Integrity is very important to him. You'll never see Dad too emotional, but we did have one moment after the final where he said something that meant a lot to me. It was nice, but it will stay private."
The fairytale dimension to what they've done is maybe best encapsulated in the matinee idol features of young Shane O'Donnell. When a kid scores 3-3 in the biggest game there is, you know lives are changing irrevocably.
As Davy called him aside in St Patrick's College to tell him he was starting the replay, it was the manager, not the kid who felt his eyes sting.
"I actually got a bit emotional telling him because I felt I was pitching this 19-year-old into something huge and I just have unreal time for the kid. I remember seeing him at minor last year and some of the lads thought I was crazy when I suggested bringing him onto the panel. Did I think he'd have the impact he had? No.
"I just wanted to get my hands on some of the younger players, so that we could control their training loads.
"What I liked about Shane was, when he got the ball, he only knew one thing. That was to turn and go for goal. From the first time I saw him, I could see that he was brave and seemed to have a very good head on him. Then when I got to meet him, I actually liked him way more.
"Because he's just one of these no bulls**t kids. He's a good fella and I think he's handling himself well. It's going to be tough for him over the next two or three years to live up to what he's just done. But I think he can do it."
The emotional gradient for Clare, generally, will be steep these next 12 months. Fitzgerald travels to America for a golf holiday this week with his son, Colm, and some friends. Only after that will he allow the future to settle into view.
"Look," he says, "Kilkenny is the best team I've ever seen. Tipperary had a stretch there where they played great stuff. Cork in the early 2000s were unreal. So let's not read into this rubbish that Clare are going to be dominant for the next four or five years.
"Every team is going to get bad beatings and Clare will be no different. It's great that there's such goodwill out there for us right now, but I'm a realist. I know that's going to change. That said, I'd like to think we'll win more than we're beaten in. And I'd certainly hope that, in the next four or five years, we can get back to another All-Ireland final and win it.
"Will we be trying hard next year to defend our title? You can write it down we will. But there'll be seven or eight teams nipping at our tails.
"The important thing is that no one can ever take away that we are the 2013 All-Ireland champions. That's an unreal feeling."

What a petty child this Davy Fitzgerald is...

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Trying to have a fight after a match with a journalist, and then banning him from any future briefings because he 'tried to destroy Clare hurling and succeeded'. I haven't read the article in question but, unless there was anything personal and nasty about Fitzgerald, then the man sounds like he was just doing his job. But, for revenge, the childish Davy tries to ruin the man's career.

Pathetic, Davy. Time to grow up.

(Apologies RMD, if this causes Davy to sever all links with this forum.)

Thomas Clarke wrote:What a petty child this Davy Fitzgerald is...

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Trying to have a fight after a match with a journalist, and then banning him from any future briefings because he 'tried to destroy Clare hurling and succeeded'.  I haven't read the article in question but, unless there was anything personal and nasty about Fitzgerald, then the man sounds like he was just doing his job.  But, for revenge, the childish Davy tries to ruin the man's career.

Pathetic, Davy.  Time to grow up.

(Apologies RMD, if this causes Davy to sever all links with this forum.)

A bit late for Davy to grow up now TC. They thrive on the siege mentality apparently, shades of Ger Lock's persecution by the Munster Council back in the 90's re-surfacing.

Oh! RMD ran Davy's spokesman out of here years ago - a pity in hindsight, but RMD was taking the Jim McGuinness line with insubordinates......