Brady ready for next level with Dubs

DOES Tomás Brady represent the changing of the guard in Dublin? Up to very recently, and given a choice, any dual player up to the standard opted for football, and thus it is that the likes of Shane Ryan and Conal Keaney — to name but two on the current Dublin senior football team — became heroes of the Hill.

Well, Tomás is also a dual player, from a dual club; though chosen a few years ago on a development divisional team for the senior footballers, however, he decided to throw in his lot with the hurlers, and this Sunday will line out at full-back against Kilkenny in the Leinster final in Croke Park. With guys like David O’Callaghan and John McCaffrey now also opting for hurling, is this a sign of things to come?

It was a Damascene-type decision, transformation rather than gradual conversion. In 1999 his club, Na Fianna, reached the All-Ireland football final, and the then 12-year-old Tomás was mightily impressed, himself hell-bent on following in the footsteps of guys like Dessie Farrell and Jason Sherlock, and becoming a Dublin footballer. “Definitely I would have seen myself playing in a football jersey rather than a hurling one. At the time I wouldn’t have known any of the hurlers, whereas I’d have known the names of every one of footballers. I started playing football first and I would have preferred it up to minor. Then in 2005 the minor hurlers did well and the footballers were not doing well at the time, so suddenly hurling was the sport.”