Before the head­line writes itself, Will O’Donoghue makes clear that he was never going to make the books of Manchester United.

He played soc­cer grow­ing up but his own theatre of dreams was quite lit­er­ally out­side his door. Step out­side the fam­ily home in Lim­er­ick city and he could puck a ball to the door of the Gaelic Grounds.

Mick Mackey wasn’t just a great of Lim­er­ick hurl­ing but one of the game’s greats. The stand named in his hon­our was just one of the things that nat­ur­ally drew him­self into the world of hurl­ing when other sports were vying for his atten­tion as a kid.

‘I was big into soc­cer, I was big into Gaelic foot­ball,’ he explains. ‘I prob­ably dreamed about play­ing for Man United as much as I did play for Lim­er­ick, as a young kid. But from the age of 12 or 13, when you’re actu­ally that bit more ser­i­ous and actu­ally are aware of what’s going on around you, yeah, it was abso­lutely the goal.

‘It wasn’t exactly a lin­ear line for me either, that it was like, “oh, I’m destined to play for Lim­er­ick”. It was prob­ably a round­about way and took a lot of time and effort and con­sist­ent improve­ment to get there, so it wasn’t something that was always going to exactly be put in front of me.’

As to when exactly the dream of play­ing for the Red Dev­ils was extin­guished?

‘That died once I real­ised that just because you own a soc­cer ball doesn’t mean you get to play for Man United,’ he says, laugh­ing. ‘This wasn’t a tan­gible thing. I mean, this was the inno­cence of being about eight years of age think­ing, “Surely I can play there.”

‘No, that wasn’t a tan­gible dream, ever. I played for Caher­davin Celtic there, it’s right across the road from Na Piar­saigh, and I guess the only thing I was say­ing there was it wasn’t that I was just hurl­ing mad. I love play­ing every sport, love play­ing Gaelic foot­ball, but cer­tainly don’t put in the paper that it was a real pos­sib­il­ity, that I had a decision to make!’

When it came to hurl­ing, Na Piar­saigh was the club hub. Since then, the fam­ily moved around the corner to a new house that still was a stone’s throw from where O’Donoghue has enjoyed so many great days.

‘Obvi­ously hav­ing the Gaelic Grounds on my door­step, I’m very pas­sion­ate about Lim­er­ick, very pas­sion­ate about Lim­er­ick GAA.

‘To be able to do that as a child play­ing, grow­ing up to be able to be out there with these lads and rep­res­ent­ing Lim­er­ick is obvi­ously a massive dream come true.’

When it comes to mem­or­able vis­its grow­ing up, he points to how the Tip­per­ary tri­logy in Mun­ster left an indelible mark. ‘Def­in­itely, I would say, ’07 there, the third game against Tipp. I got Séamus Hickey’s jer­sey that day. I was one of the ones who kind of went onto the pitch that bit early and got shep­her­ded off.

‘And then there was a Na Piar­saigh man Paul Mur­ray, who was involved with Lim­er­ick at the time, doing physio, and I remem­ber kind of scur­ry­ing my way under the Mackey Stand and Paul threw me out Séamus Hickey’s jer­sey and I still have it at home. I brought it to the media night in ’07 and had the whole back of it signed. They’re a bit faint now, it’s been 20-odd years.’

He recalls the county hold­ing ‘an open train­ing ses­sion under the Mackey Stand there and I remem­ber queuing up to get it signed.’

That was the sum­mer man­ager Richie Ben­nis gave Babs Keat­ing the big bear hug at the side of the pitch. Back then, Lim­er­ick were still des­per­ately search­ing for a first All-Ire­land win since 1973. There was the hun­ger and motiv­a­tion in try­ing to bridge that 45-year gap in 2018. Then the motiv­a­tion of two-in-a-row, three-in-a-row, four-in-a-row.

So what is the motiv­a­tion now?

‘I don’t think it’s changed an awful lot. I don’t think so, no. If you were to ask me what was the car­rot at the end of the 2018 final, it was an All-Ire­land medal. What was the car­rot at the end of 2020? It was an All-Ire­land medal.

The car­rot at the end of this one is another All-Ire­land medal.

‘I’m sure the ques­tion is com­ing, “Does it mean more that you haven’t been there for the last two years?” I don’t think it does, to be hon­est, because if you were to ask me before the 2023 All-Ire­land final, how excited are you for this All-Ire­land final? I was pretty excited.

‘Am I more appre­ci­at­ive of being there? Poten­tially not, but I know what it’s like, I know what the hurt is like to not be there. I’m glad I’m deal­ing with the excite­ment of being there and not the hurt of not.’

As a mid­fielder, he developed his game to become an indis­pens­able part of Lim­er­ick’s four-ina-row. When it comes to workrate, intens­ity of effort and the hook/block/tackle/turnover counts that point to the engine room of any team, they are his call­ing card.

Rangy, unflinch­ing and a force of nature around that middle third, it was that abil­ity to also pro­tect the cent­ral defens­ive chan­nel and let Declan Han­non work his magic as a fluid num­ber six who knit­ted together so much of Lim­er­ick’s counter-attack­ing play that made him doubly valu­able.

So it was a big ask to give up all of that and replace hurl­ing’s most dec­or­ated All-Ire­land win­ning cap­tain in that six jer­sey. He’s a dif­fer­ent type of centre-back to Han­non whose silky ball-strik­ing and crisp stick­work became a kind of USP.

O’Donoghue has trans­ferred the same qual­it­ies that made him a two-time All-Star mid­fielder to form such an impos­ing half-back line this year with Diar­maid Byrnes in Hurler of the Year ter­rit­ory and Kyle Hayes offer­ing so much going both dir­ec­tions.

‘I’ve got big shoes to fill and I don’t think I’ll ever have time to fill them,’ he says mod­estly of repla­cing the retired Han­non.

Now 31, his lead­er­ship qual­it­ies have seen him cap­tain Na Piar­saigh to Lim­er­ick county cham­pi­on­ships and led to him being the Lim­er­ick vice-cap­tain.

He’s come a long way then since the county’s break­through year when he was a late sub­sti­tute in the final.

‘In 2018, I was just about see­ing game time. It’s not like I was very young either. I guess I was prob­ably 23. I’m obvi­ously very proud that I’ve man­aged to stay a part of the group and con­trib­ute to the group.’

Proof that time and ded­ic­a­tion can go a long way.

From grow­ing up in sight of the Mackey Stand to run­ning out at Croke Park, one theatre of dreams has led on to another.