Post by Admin on Dec 12, 2014 23:40:50 GMT
Martin Brenheny - Irish Independent - 11th December 2014
John O'Dwyer glanced around Croke Park and let his mind drift back three months.
The stadium was empty yesterday except for the groundsmen who tend the surface with unyielding devotion in all seasons and two dozen pigeons who obviously found tasty pickings to detain them in front of Hill 16.
"It's a bit surreal to be here when the ground is empty," said O'Dwyer, who was in the company of 165,000 others for his last two visits in September.
A student in Cork IT, he was back in Croke Park for the draw for the 2015 Independent.ie Higher Education GAA senior championships. And while those competitions are now very much on the minds of third-level teams, O'Dwyer was inevitably drawn back to the memorable Kilkenny-Tipperary All-Ireland clashes.
The contrast between Croke Park on a cold, raw December day and the boiling cauldron of an All-Ireland final Sunday could not be more stark but the posts down at the Canal End look the same, whatever the occasion or time of year.
For several agonising seconds deep in stoppage-time in the drawn final, one of them became the centre of attention as Hawk-Eye figured out whether O'Dwyer's free from almost 100 metres had yielded the point which would almost certainly have won the game for Tipperary.
The following day's Irish Independent ran two pictures of O'Dwyer, one as he pointed to the sky, believing that his strike was good, the other as he realised a few seconds later that Hawk-Eye had called it wide.
It was the ultimate in emotional swings for O'Dwyer and his Tipp colleagues, who lost the replay.
O'Dwyer, affectionately known as 'Bubbles', was convinced after striking the ball that it was on a perfect act to glory.
"I definitely thought it was over. I couldn't have hit it any better. It was a bit higher than the post. I thought it might have swung wide after going higher the post rather than before it but obviously it didn't. The technology showed it was wide," he said.
It was O'Dwyer's only wide on a day when he scored 0-7 (0-5 from open play).
ACCURATE
Indeed, he had been so consistently accurate that Kilkenny were preparing for the worst when he lined up the free, hoping that they would get some precious seconds to try for an equaliser.
"I kind of thought he would score it because he (O'Dwyer) is very good at it," said Brian Cody.
It was desperately disappointing for Tipp and O'Dwyer, who believes that adrenaline gave him the power to fire the ball so far in such pressurised circumstances.
"The following Tuesday night at training in Semple Stadium, I put the ball down in the same area as the free had been in Croke Park. I didn't even reach the goal. I suppose the adrenaline was in full flow in Croke Park - it was a sweet strike but unfortunately it was just wide," he said.
It was to prove Tipp's best chance of winning the All-Ireland. For while they troubled Kilkenny all the way in the replay, they just couldn't get themselves into a winning position when it counted most.
"We made a very bad start to the second half when Kilkenny really got their game going. It took us a while to respond. That left us with an awful lot to do and might well have cost us the game," said O'Dwyer.
Now, the challenge for Tipperary is to learn from this year as they look ahead to 2015 among a lengthy list of high-powered contenders.
"There are six, seven of eight teams that can win the All-Ireland and we're one of them. We have to take the positives from this year and build on them," said O'Dwyer.
While Tipp finished the season well, albeit deep in disappointment, they wandered down inconsistent lanes earlier on, which raised doubt about them, both inside and outside the county.
Some very poor performances early in the Allianz League drew lots of criticism before they recovered equilibrium and reached the final, where they lost to Kilkenny.
The defeat by Limerick in the Munster semi-final looked like a serious setback, especially when they trailed Galway by six points midway through the second half of a qualifier.
However, all changed from there on as Tipperary finally reached - and maintained - the levels their talents merited.
"We had to build ourselves back up after losing to Limerick. We managed to do that and, from the Galway game on, we kept improving," said O'Dwyer.
But what explains the inconsistency of earlier on?
"Some days, it just doesn't happen for players. Maybe that was happening too often for us at the start of the year, but we weren't all that settled for a while. From the Galway game on, we had a fairly settled look and we went a lot better," he said.
Irish Independent
The stadium was empty yesterday except for the groundsmen who tend the surface with unyielding devotion in all seasons and two dozen pigeons who obviously found tasty pickings to detain them in front of Hill 16.
"It's a bit surreal to be here when the ground is empty," said O'Dwyer, who was in the company of 165,000 others for his last two visits in September.
A student in Cork IT, he was back in Croke Park for the draw for the 2015 Independent.ie Higher Education GAA senior championships. And while those competitions are now very much on the minds of third-level teams, O'Dwyer was inevitably drawn back to the memorable Kilkenny-Tipperary All-Ireland clashes.
The contrast between Croke Park on a cold, raw December day and the boiling cauldron of an All-Ireland final Sunday could not be more stark but the posts down at the Canal End look the same, whatever the occasion or time of year.
For several agonising seconds deep in stoppage-time in the drawn final, one of them became the centre of attention as Hawk-Eye figured out whether O'Dwyer's free from almost 100 metres had yielded the point which would almost certainly have won the game for Tipperary.
The following day's Irish Independent ran two pictures of O'Dwyer, one as he pointed to the sky, believing that his strike was good, the other as he realised a few seconds later that Hawk-Eye had called it wide.
It was the ultimate in emotional swings for O'Dwyer and his Tipp colleagues, who lost the replay.
O'Dwyer, affectionately known as 'Bubbles', was convinced after striking the ball that it was on a perfect act to glory.
"I definitely thought it was over. I couldn't have hit it any better. It was a bit higher than the post. I thought it might have swung wide after going higher the post rather than before it but obviously it didn't. The technology showed it was wide," he said.
It was O'Dwyer's only wide on a day when he scored 0-7 (0-5 from open play).
ACCURATE
Indeed, he had been so consistently accurate that Kilkenny were preparing for the worst when he lined up the free, hoping that they would get some precious seconds to try for an equaliser.
"I kind of thought he would score it because he (O'Dwyer) is very good at it," said Brian Cody.
It was desperately disappointing for Tipp and O'Dwyer, who believes that adrenaline gave him the power to fire the ball so far in such pressurised circumstances.
"The following Tuesday night at training in Semple Stadium, I put the ball down in the same area as the free had been in Croke Park. I didn't even reach the goal. I suppose the adrenaline was in full flow in Croke Park - it was a sweet strike but unfortunately it was just wide," he said.
It was to prove Tipp's best chance of winning the All-Ireland. For while they troubled Kilkenny all the way in the replay, they just couldn't get themselves into a winning position when it counted most.
"We made a very bad start to the second half when Kilkenny really got their game going. It took us a while to respond. That left us with an awful lot to do and might well have cost us the game," said O'Dwyer.
Now, the challenge for Tipperary is to learn from this year as they look ahead to 2015 among a lengthy list of high-powered contenders.
"There are six, seven of eight teams that can win the All-Ireland and we're one of them. We have to take the positives from this year and build on them," said O'Dwyer.
While Tipp finished the season well, albeit deep in disappointment, they wandered down inconsistent lanes earlier on, which raised doubt about them, both inside and outside the county.
Some very poor performances early in the Allianz League drew lots of criticism before they recovered equilibrium and reached the final, where they lost to Kilkenny.
The defeat by Limerick in the Munster semi-final looked like a serious setback, especially when they trailed Galway by six points midway through the second half of a qualifier.
However, all changed from there on as Tipperary finally reached - and maintained - the levels their talents merited.
"We had to build ourselves back up after losing to Limerick. We managed to do that and, from the Galway game on, we kept improving," said O'Dwyer.
But what explains the inconsistency of earlier on?
"Some days, it just doesn't happen for players. Maybe that was happening too often for us at the start of the year, but we weren't all that settled for a while. From the Galway game on, we had a fairly settled look and we went a lot better," he said.
Irish Independent