Waterford manager Liam Cahill won one All Ireland as a player with Tipperary and lost one.
He kicked home a second half goal in the 1997 decider against Clare. A late, late Jamesie O’Connor point saw the Banner lift their second Liam MacCarthy in three years. “I recall a lot of disappointment after the match to be honest. It was a game that I don’t think either team hurled really well."
Four years later, he was an unused sub as Nicky English’s men got the better of Galway. “That’s the other side of the coin. There’s a big difference between winning and losing. Everyone likes to win an All Ireland medal between the lines, I didn’t that day but I did play in all the games leading up to that. It was a big day for all the panel and equally as joyful for me even though I didn’t get to play on the field. A great occasion and definitely life changing when you come back to your own county with an All Ireland medal. It puts you into the history books. It also brings its demands. When you’re an All Ireland medal winner, you have to conduct yourself accordingly and come back to your club and lead by example.”
He is receiving plenty of well wishes from the Premier County ahead of Sunday's final. “I am, to be fair. I’m not sure is there too many in Carrick-On-Suir and that area! To be honest, there is a lot of goodwill out there from Tipperary people. That’s something that gives me great pride. You walk down the street in Thurles and people are wishing you luck. It’s a great sign of people and it’s a great sign of what we’re about in the GAA.”
Messages are flooding in from further afield as well. In 1998 and 1999, he helped Meath to win back to back All Ireland junior titles as coach. How did a Tipperary hurler end up training the Royal County? “That’s a long story! I was working with a company in Dublin at the time and a really good friend of mine and still to this day Noel Keating got in touch with me, a Grangemockler/Ballyneale man, from the same parish as the great Michael Hogan, it’s fitting for the year that’s in it. I just went out one night to do a training session; I was hurling myself at the time. I was just sitting in digs in Dublin one night and I went out to do a session with the Meath junior hurling team. It was only meant to be one but I ended up doing more than one! Ten or twelve sessions. By luck, they got into the All Ireland final that year and got over the line. I hadn’t a massive part to play in it but I did help and it was really enjoyable and I made a lot of friends up in Meath. Great times.”
Cahill believes that his team have what it takes to lift Liam MacCarthy on Sunday. “These players are really good players, I’ve always said that from day one. They’ve really applied themselves well to put themselves in the position they’re in now. I’m confident that these players will grasp this opportunity and they’ll give it everything on the field to get over the line. It won’t be from the want of trying. If we bring everything we’ve got and come with everything we have and hurl without fear of failure and things don’t happen, I’ll be the first man to shake a Limerick man’s hand because we’ll be beaten by a better team. That’s all we can ask for, my boys to go to Croke Park on Sunday and throw off the shackles and hurl and see where it takes us and please god it will take us to where we want to go.”
Listen back to the Lár Na Páirce All Ireland Final Special.
https://www.spreaker.com/user/wlrfm/larnapairceallirelandfinalspecial_1
