Joyce and Canning lead Galway drive in West’s best
Canning hits summit just ahead of Cooney and Connolly
PÁDRAIC JOYCE and Joe Canning will head the Galway challenge in pursuit of places on the national 1-20 football and hurling ranking lists which are now headed for the provincial stages.
Today, as part of our 202050 series where we name the top hurlers and football over the past 50 years, we carry the Connacht football and Galway hurling 1-20s. The provincial rankings (four football, three hurling) will be published tomorrow, followed on Saturday by the two national top 20s.
Canning takes top spot in Galway hurling, edging out fellow ‘JCs’, Joe Cooney and John Connolly. All three are former Hurler of the Year award winners and, between them, have given the county 42 years’ combined service. Canning (31) will extend that whenever the GAA scene re-opens.
Peter Finnerty, a five-time All-Star, comes fourth, followed by Conor Hayes, the most successful captain in Galway hurling history.
In football, Joyce is followed by Ja Fallon, Michael Donnellan, Kevin Walsh and Seán Óg de Paor, four others who did so much to bring Sam Maguire west in 1998 and 2001.
Lee Keegan heads the Mayo rankings and is the only No 1 in the five Connacht counties who is still playing. Liam McHale, Keith Higgins and James Nallen are next in line.
Roscommon legend Dermot Earley takes top spot in Roscommon, followed by Tony McManus and Harry Keegan. Mickey Kearins, regarded as one of the best footballers never to win an AllIreland medal, leads the Sligo rankings, with Mickey Quinn and Seamus Quinn tops in Leitrim.
WHAT were the odds on the three best Galway hurlers of the last 50 years – and possibly of all time – having the same initials?
A real longshot, but it came to pass with John Connolly, Joe Cooney and Joe Canning showcasing their amazing array skills for a combined total of 42 years. And with Canning still playing, that span will extend further whenever the current plague lifts.
Connolly starred between 1967 and 1981, Cooney between 1984 and 2000, while Canning’s on-going career was launched in 2008.
Ranking the three JCs against each other is the ultimate in borderline judgement, which is why opinion remains divided in Galway.
Unlike Cooney (below, left) and Canning, Connolly (below, right) was part of a generation of players that had to work very hard to shake off the seriously damaging impact of a depressing decade in the Munster championship in the 1960s.
They eventually succeeded in not only doing that, but also in taking Galway to the top table, first with a hugely important National League
success in 1975, followed up five years later by a first All-Ireland title for 57 years. Connolly’s role in driving the squad forward during that period, a process which created a new and positive environment for youngsters, should never be forgotten. His selection as Galway’s first Hurler of the Year in 1980 was wholly appropriate. Cooney and the under-18 class of 1983, which won Galway’s first All-Ireland MHC title, benefited from the new sense of confidence, with many of them going on to enjoy great senior careers. Cooney was the leader of that pack. A five-time
All Star, he was Hurler of the Year in 1987 and continued to excel in a career which also yielded two All-Ireland club titles with Sarsfields. Joe Canning was born a month after Galway won the 1988 AllIreland final, a time when they assumed more titles would flow quite regularly. Incredibly, it was another 29 years before their next success, with Canning one of the main men. It’s a role he filled ever since his explosive senior debut in 2008. We’re ranking him at No 1, just ahead of Cooney and Connolly.
Five-time All Star, Pete Finnerty, a wing-back of ferocious power and determination, comes next followed by Conor Hayes, one of a small Galway group who won three All-Ireland medals in the 1980s. One of the smartest full-backs in the game and a man for the really big days, he was also an excellent leader, highlighted by captaining Galway to the All-Ireland double in 1987-88.
Like John Connolly, Iggy Clarke was part of the squad that took Galway out of the doldrums in the mid-1970s. Unfortunately, he missed the 1980 All-Ireland final win through injury, but did enough before and after to be in the top six, followed by Tony Keady, the powerhouse centre-back and Hurler of the Year in 1988.
The impact of the Canning family on Galway hurling is underlined by having two in the leading group, with Joe’s older brother, Ollie coming in at No 7. He is the only one in the top 16 to not have won an All-Ireland senior inter-county medal. He did, of course, win four All-Irelands with Portumna.