Just when things were starting to look up.
Jesus, what a blow for Dublin. What a blow for Dublin hurling and what a blow for the Dublin county board.
Befor 2018, their county’s hurlers had been in the wilderness for way too long. Anthony Daly left the scene back in 2014 and that sent Dublin hurling into an extended hangover. Ger Cunningham was appointed as Daly’s successor and his tenure was put mildly, a disaster.
The camp always looked like a divided one and the bottom line was that players didn’t seem to want to play hurling for Dublin anymore. You’d players like Mark Schutte leaving to play football even though he had no real chance of making the team and you’d others like Michael Carton and Conal Keaney opting out.
That panel and that team were in disarray.
And then Cunningham left and it looked like Dublin had found the ideal successor. Former All-Ireland winning football manager Pat Gilroy came in and though his impact wasn’t instant in terms of results, the League was never really his or their target. He was a leader and he was leading.
The main thing was that the best hurlers in Dublin were beginning to play for Dublin again. That man Keaney was back in sky blue and some other senior players came back as well.
And it looked like Pat Gilroy had a plan. They hit the Leinster round-robin hard with Liam Rushe hurling the best stuff of his life and Conal Keaney playing like a 25-year-old in his prime. Sean Moran was doing it like he does for Cuala and Chris Crummey and Shane Barrett completed a fairly formidable half back line.
Youngsters like Paul Winters, Donal Burke, Rian McBride and Paddy Smyth were coming of age and everything was coming together.
Yeah, the results didn’t go their way in the end but the important thing was that the building blocks had been put in place and 2019 looked like it was going to be Dublin’s year.
And then out of nowhere, a lot of that progress is put into doubt. Pat Gilroy announces that due to the travelling commitments involved with his job, he had no option but to call it off.
Nobody could have seen this coming because Pat Gilroy was always so assured and so focused that you just felt like that first year was only the first step on his grand master plan.
But what’s done is done and the Dublin county board need to act now.
And they’ve an ideal candidate on their doorstep. He may take some convincing seeing as he’s with the Cuala senior hurlers right now but the Dublin county board will need to do everything within their power to get him in.
Mattie Kenny has won three Dublin senior hurling titles in three years. He’s seen every senior hurler in Dublin in action in those three years. The Galway man has shown with two All-Irelands in the last two that he knows what he’s doing.
Word has it that Waterford are in the hunt for him too, but surely the Dublin job, given his circumstances, would be the preferred one for him.
And if Anthony Cunningham and the rest of the backroom team remain in place, Dublin hurling can overcome this bump in the road with minimal fuss and regain progress again.
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