Versatile coach Casey revelling in his De La Salle roots

PROUD Waterford man Mick Casey was part of the remarkable Wexford football odyssey last season, sharing the training and coaching duties with Jason Ryan.

Now, he’s living the real dream of seeing De La Salle embarking on an unexpected journey which they hope will earn them a place in the AIB All-Ireland club hurling final in Croke Park on St Patrick’s Day.

He’s not just the team trainer, but also coaches — “most of the stuff is with the ball and hurley” — and helps out as physio.

“This is what it’s all about. You can dress up the inter-county stuff as much as you like but the club is really where it’s at,” he says. “It’s close to the bone, it is your bones really.”

Players may get caught up in the glamour of inter-county competition they have been fortunate that John Mullane, Kevin Moran and Brian Phelan have provided massive leadership along the way.

There is no question of anybody taking anything for granted — prior to winning their first county championship last October, the club only tasted victory in a minor championship with Casey involved as a 17-year-old.

That was back in 1989 and the team included current manager Owen Dunphy and selector Alan Duggan.

“It’s total fairytale stuff,’’ he adds. “It’s easy for us to be focused and romantic as a group of players because we have won nothing.” Notably, their provincial debut — against the Cork champions Sarsfields, in Páirc Uí Chaoimh — came just a week after their county championship breakthrough, which meant that celebrations had to be put on told.

“It wasn’t really the management who decided that,’’ he commented. “This was really the players’ call. To a man there wasn’t one crib or gripe about it. The attitude was, ‘look it’s our first time, let’s go for it and try and do something in Munster that no Waterford team has done in a while and really get our heads above it.’”

He has nightmares when he thinks back to the Munster final, how they almost blew their chance of taking the title. “The occasion got to us in the first half. The lads seemed to play the occasion rather than the hurling we have come to expect throughout the year. We lost our shape completely. We badly needed to batten down the hatches until half time and change things around.”

Afterwards they celebrated on the field not just with their own people, but with supporters from all over the county and from rival clubs. And, that goodwill has been matched in recent weeks. “Because of the bad weather we struggled to find venues to train and clubs generously offered the use of their facilities,’’ he added.

It worries him that they have been installed as strong favourites, saying: “I just cannot understand how people can write off Cushendall so easily — especially when they are playing us.

“We have never been there before, we have no experience and we have a lot of players that nobody heard of before. If you look at their team, they have seven players with Antrim who are making good strides and are steeped in hurling tradition.”