ON A QUEST
NOLAN GALWAY v KILKENNY Glynn return can only be a positive for maroons
IT’S now 15 years since Galway first took their place in the Leinster Championship.
Their first game in the province was a long forgotten quarter-final against Laois, which they won by 27 points, to set up a semi-final with Kilkenny.
It was the first time Joe Canning, then 20, had faced the Cats, who were going for four AllIrelands in-a-row and had won nine of the previous 10 Leinster finals, which is Galway’s move east was considered essential.
On an electric evening in Tullamore, Canning made a lightning start, goaling for Galway in the fifth minute after spinning away from JJ Delaney but his ultimate tally of 2-9 wasn’t enough as Kilkenny won by four points.
“I was always wondering in one sense what it was like to play against them,”he said at the time. “The intensity and physicality is definitely more than it would be against anybody else.”
Format
It would be three more years before Galway would beat Kilkenny, shocking them in the 2012 Leinster final, but it would be another six years again before they beat them again.
That was a Leinster round robin tie in 2018, the first year of the group format, a setting where they’ve done well against them having won three and drawn one of their four meetings.
But Kilkenny have invariably ended up with the title having won the last four.
So, three Leinster titles from 15 attempts isn’t a great return really, is it?
“Here’s the headline now,” says Canning dryly. “Like, it is poor, three out of 15.
“One All-Ireland in 36 years, is that a poor return? We’ve only five in all of history, is that a poor return? Yeah.
“Whether you want to look back over those years or try to improve the future of it, there’s no point looking back going, ‘That’s really poor’.
“It’s about what you’re going to do this year and obviously the next few years.”
There is a feeling that Henry Shefflin, in his third year in charge of Galway, needs to put a trophy on the sideboard.
With the All-Ireland a big ask given the level Limerick have been at and the League diminished currency, Leinster is the lowest hanging fruit, particularly in an era where Kilkenny aren’t hoovering up titles beyond the province.
“Everybody needs silverware, no matter who you are.
“Like, John Kiely needs silverware this year, to get the five-ina-row, or the six-in-a-row.
“Henry, does he need silverware? Of course he does. Galway need silverware but so do Kilkenny or Dublin or Wexford.
“I think he’s going to be under more pressure if he doesn’t, obviously.
“Kilkenny are going for five-in-a-row of Leinster titles so, that’s not good for Leinster.
“It’s the same in Munster,
Limerick going for six?You don’t want a dominant team in any (competition).”
Kilkenny come to Salthill tomorrow in what is widely expected to be a dress rehearsal for the Leinster final.
Canning, however, believes Wexford and Dublin may yet have a say in that, and reckons there’s enough at stake.
“It’s still Henry Shefflin against Kilkenny, Richie [O’Neill] is there as well. Psychologically, they won’t want to lose to Kilkenny again and the players won’t want to lose to Kilkenny again.
“I think there’s more to it than what other people on the outside might.
Title
“I think they’ll want to lay down a kind of a marker.”
This is Canning’s third year away from inter-county hurling having retired in 2021.
Galway haven’t won major silverware since, while their last trophy without him was the 2004 National League.
Indeed, they haven’t won a major title without a Canning on the squad since 1989.
But while elder brother Ollie didn’t win a Celtic Cross, Joe got his All-Ireland in 2017. He insists that it doesn’t crown his career, however.
“No. No. I think other people view it differently. I don’t really.
“Like, has it changed anything for me that I have a medal? Only people can say that you have it compared to, ‘Oh Jesus, terrible you never won an All-Ireland’.
“Like, it hasn’t really, no. Personally it hasn’t.
“Has it enhanced me professionally any way or sportingwise? No, I don’t think so. Not to me anyway.
“It’s at home somewhere in the house. It’s in a box somewhere. And that’s it.
“It’s not something I look at every day or carry around with me or anything like that.
“Obviously it’s great to win it and everything like that and I’m not downing it at all but people have often said, ‘Jesus when you win an All-Ireland it changes your life’. I haven’t seen that.”
Canning says there is no downside to Johnny Glynn rejoining the Galway panel.
Shefflin confirmed that after the player came on board for a number of sessions and travelling to Portugal for a training camp, the 2017 All-Ireland winner has been added to the Championship squad, though he didn’t feature in last Sunday’s opening win over Carlow.
Glynn, who is largely based in New York and has played football for the Exiles in the Championship, last lined out for his native county in 2019.
“Johnny’s a serious operator,” says Canning.
“He brings so much to the team environment as well as what he’ll bring on the field of play.
“He’s a different type of hurler than probably what’s there at the moment. Wouldn’t be blessed with the biggest of guys either.
“Johnny’s aerial ability, how they use him, I don’t know.
“When he was playing before we used him in a variety of different positions, wing-forward, full-forward, whatever, centre-forward.
“How they’ll use him, I don’t know. But I can only see positives from it.
“Johnny’s in serious shape, he always has been. He’s been training inter-county standard for the last number of years anyway, playing football with New York and stuff.
Fitter
“He’s doing jiu jitsu and that sort of stuff so there’s nobody fitter than Johnny, like. So physically he’ll be fine, just his hurling, what way it’ll be?
“He was hurling last year, coming back the whole time with Ardrahan and was doing very well in club championship, whenever he came back, so I have no worries about Johnny, it’s just how Henry uses him.
“I don’t think many full-back lines or a half-back will want to see Johnny Glynn coming in on him either because he’s like 6ft 5”in, very powerful, left-hander as well who’s always a little bit more difficult to mark.
“What’s the negative?You bring him in, he doesn’t perform, fair enough but you’ll never know if you don’t bring him in, you’re always wondering, ‘Jesus, if we had Johnny Glynn’ but now you have him so why not use him.”