CLARE’S CUNNINGHAM SAYS MOMENTUM IS WITH TIPPERARY
AS a child, Aaron Cunningham was brought to plenty of the fast and furious Championship clashes between Clare and Tipperary in the late 1990s — not that he can recall much of them. ‘I would have been at a lot of those games, but I don’t remember most of them,’ says the 24-yearold Banner forward. ‘I would have just been dragged along by the parents. There was more of a rivalry back then. We haven’t met in the Championship for a good few years but for the players, the rivalry still exists.’ What was different about the rivalry back then was that Clare held the upper hand — beating Tipp in two Munster finals and an All-Ireland final between 1995 and 1997. It was one of the few times in the history between the two counties that Clare were on top, although Aaron’s father Alan was part of the Clare side that famously upset the Premier County in 1986. ‘I have seen a bit of that game on YouTube. Someone had it up a few weeks ago. It’s a fairly different style of hurling to what we are playing now.’ The old intensity is sure to resurface this Saturday especially with a place in the All-Ireland semi-finals up for grabs and the chance for Clare to return to Croke Park for the first time since they captured Liam MacCarthy in 2013. But the sides are approaching the first inter-county game in the new Paírc Uí Chaoimh from vastly different places. While Tipperary appear to have found their groove again — hitting Dublin for 6-26 in Thurles 10 days ago — Clare are trying to recover from a disappointing Munster final performance. Cunningham accepts the Banner need to get back to Croker for this to be viewed as a successful year. ‘It’s strange. You are going from preparing for a Munster final and everything is all rosy and three weeks later, your season could be finished. ‘There is a lot of pressure on the Tipp game but they’re going in as AllIreland champions and there’s huge pressure on them as well,’ he says. ‘But Tipp do have the momentum. The last day was huge for them because there was a lot of talk about them having a poor year and not being together. They now believe again that they are back to their best and unfortunately for us, we’re the team that’ll have to stand up and try and face that.’ It’s his sixth Championship season with Clare, but he has yet to nail down a regular starting place. He made his Championship debut against Limerick back in 2012, but struggles with recurring shoulder and hamstring injuries meant he missed a large
chunk of the following two seasons. However, in 2015, he came back with a bang, scoring two goals against Limerick in the Championship. He concedes he should be starting more regularly by this stage of his career. ‘I think it’s strange when you think 2012 is six seasons away and it only seems like yesterday but I probably haven’t cemented a place on the team since. The competition is huge, especially in the fullforward line. Conor McGrath and Shane O’Donnell, every single night at training, they’re on the top of their game. I’m not far off it now. I was disappointed not to get the start the last day but hopefully I can work hard for the week and I might get a shot the next day.’ Last year, it looked like Cunningham finally secured a place in the fullforward line, playing every game as Clare won their first National League title in 38 years before injuries came back to haunt him. ‘This is my first year now where I have been injuryfree and got a good run at it but I haven’t nailed down that spot.’ The Banner full-forward line failed to spark against Cork in the Munster final, so there may be an opportunity for Cunningham this Saturday. ‘In fairness to the three boys inside the last day, we didn’t get the ball into them. If you’d seen the ball Cork were getting into Alan Cadogan and Pat Horgan, it was frightening. We’d feel we have lads of that calibre up the other end but we just starved them of ball.’ If Clare are to rescue their summer when they cut the ribbon on Páirc Ui Chaoimh, that’s one thing that needs to be addressed.