Tooreen look in Tipp’ top shape for second coming
Tooreen captain Daniel Huane with manager Ray Larkin.
Their word has been their bond.
When Tooreen broke new ground and became the first Mayo club to reach an All-Ireland hurling final in 2023, they vowed it would not be their last.
They had played better than Monaleen, of that there was little dispute. They had out-hurled the Limerick side for long stretches in Croke Park that cold January night. But they were beaten. Caught at the death. Pipped on the line. It was a brutal and bruising experience. But what didn’t kill Tooreen has made them stronger. Better. Bigger.
Whether it has turned them into All-Ireland champions however, won’t be revealed until next Saturday evening – but Daniel Huane can hardly wait to find out.
The captain of Tooreen looks to have timed his recovery from injury to perfection. Laid low in the Connacht quarter-final against Four Roads by a late hit that damaged the AC joint in his left shoulder, Huane returned to play the final 20 minutes of Tooreen’s All-Ireland semi-final victory over Ulster champions Eire Óg Carrickmore – and now is raring to lead his team into battle against Tipperary’s Upperchurch-Drombane.
“It’s something I dreamed of but something I never thought I’d get the chance to do,” says Huane about the “privilege” of wearing the armband. “I said that to Ray (Larkin) when he rang me at the start of the summer about it. I was almost in disbelief.
“It’s an unbelievable village. I wasn’t lucky enough to be born here but Tooreen’s been my home since I was 11. It’s like nowhere else I’ve ever seen. It’s the most special place in the world to me. I’d say the whole village is going to be up in the Hogan Stand in Croke Park next weekend and I can’t wait for that,” admitted the Irishtown native.
Tooreen had led the 2023 final by two points at half-time – but that didn’t reflect their dominance. And despite their accuracy slipping somewhat in the second-half, they still remained in the ascendancy after Cathal Freeman had landed his third point in the 51st minute. In fact, all six of the Blue Devil forwards scored from play.
“They brought everything, their fitness, their work rate. They had us at sixes and sevens,” admitted Monaleen boss Eoin Brislane afterwards, whose team eventually emerged victorious by two points, 1-17 to 1-15.
“It took a good while to get over that loss, especially the nature in which we lost. We felt like we should or could have won that day but I suppose that doesn’t really mean a lot. What we wanted to make sure of afterwards was that we took learnings and that that game didn’t go to waste,” reflects Daniel Huane.
“We promised ourselves that time three years ago that we would get another crack at this, so to get back here three years later, this was very much part of the plan.
“A lot of our core group at that time were probably between 20 and 25 whereas we’re much more mature as a group. We’ve had some good days and bad days since then so I think we’ve taken a lot of learnings.”
But is there a pressure in having already lost one final?
“I know it’s a cliché but pressure is a privilege,” insists Huane, a Process Development Engineer at Medtronic in Galway.
“We’ve been lucky to have played in so many high profile games in the last seven or eight years. Typically we’ve put that pressure on ourselves and it’s probably why we’ve got to where we are.
“Even against Meelick-Eyrecourt this season, a lot of the Galway media and sources outside of Mayo were kind of writing us off but that belief from within our group and from within our community, we had absolutely no doubt how good we are.”
The 12 points margin of victory over Meelick-Eyrecourt was more than double Tooreen’s previous biggest win in what now is six Connacht titles in eight seasons.
“I suppose that comes down to maturity and having played in those big games. We know we’re capable of winning at that level so it’s just about backing it up,” adds the captain.
It might be a strange thing to say about a Mayo hurling team coming up against a Tipperary hurling team, but there’s a strong case to be made that it’s Tooreen who are the more experienced heading into Saturday’s match. Not only have they that 2023 final to draw upon but for some of the players this will be their sixth time – between club and county – to play in GAA headquarters since 2020 alone, with others like Fergal Boland, David Kenny and Stephen Coyne having even more extensive experience of the big old ground.
Not every visit has been a good one – last summer’s quite surprising Nickey Rackard Cup final defeat for Mayo by Roscommon was particularly galling – but the familiarity of the surroundings is something Tooreen intend to bend to their advantage.
“It’s an unusual experience, the first time in Croke Park, going in the dressing-rooms, walking out the tunnel. The stand, whether full or not, it’s overhanging, it’s a different feeling of a pitch, the goalposts feel different, so it’s something we’ll have to use to our advantage.
“I don’t know how many of their lads have played there but 95 percent of our lads have played in Croke Park multiple times so it should be an advantage to us. We just have to use that.”
Huane adds: “The lights are so good in Croke Park you almost wouldn’t know it was dark. If you’re playing in club grounds or lesser pitches, you’ll have lower lights and a cross-field ball could get caught in the lights, but in Croke Park it’s not even a factor.”
It’s in the heart of the Slieve Felim mountains, about eight miles outside of Thurles, that you’ll find the parish of Upperchurch-Drombane. While never winning the Tipperary SHC, they had operated in the top flight for 25 continuous years until their surprise relegation in 2023. But a swift return has this season also seen them become the first Tipp club to win the Munster intermediate championship since 2012; they beat Ballinhassig of Cork in the semi-final and O’Callaghan’s Mills of Clare in the final. The latter game was defined by three red cards shown to players from O’Callaghan’s Mills, who had led 0-12 to 0-11 after 35 minutes but spiralled after the loss of their first two players, to lose 3-20 to 0-15.
Upperchurch-Drombane, who are a dual club, went on to record a two points victory over Kilkenny and Leinster champions Danesfort in the All-Ireland semi-final and in doing so – quite surprisingly given their county’s hurling traditions – are only the second Tipperary side to reach the All-Ireland Club intermediate championship decider.
“We know they’re very well-rounded,” says Daniel Huane. “They’ve no one in with the Tipperary panel at the minute but they’ve a couple of Tipp U20s from the past couple of years.
“Sometimes at intermediate, if a team has an inter-county player they may be more reliant on them but Upperchurch-Drombane, they’re not dependent on any one or two players, across the board they’re very strong and sometimes the well-rounded teams are harder to break down.
“Obviously, they’ve come out of the Tipp championship and they’ve beaten the Cork, Clare and Kilkenny intermediate champions, so we’re very aware of their quality, they’ve some very good players, but we’ve had all sorts of games over the years so hopefully there won’t be any shocks for us the next day.
“We have lost semi-finals to Munster and Leinster champions. It is something we want to do. We’ve beaten the Galway champions a few times, we want to beat the Munster or Leinster champions as well. And all the better it it’s in an All-Ireland final.”
