Hannon happy to deal with dual pressure

LEINSTER SHC (First Round): Louth v Longford (tomorrow, Portlaoise, 3.50pm)

When you are a dual inter-county player, you learn to expect this question. Are you a footballer first or a hurler?

“That’s a very difficult question and one I’ve been asked I don’t know how many times,” the Longford man explains. “I love the skill level in the game of hurling and I will always play it. I really do enjoy the game. My club team, Wolfe Tones, would be one of the biggest hurling teams in the county and all through the years, even though it is only Longford and Division Four hurling, the club scene is always very competitive.

“There is a great rivalry between each team and there is great importance given to hurling and that has been built into me during the years. I love the game. I always have. If I had to choose one I wouldn’t be able to do it. I love the buzz that comes with playing football for the county.”

This is the first year that Hannon has attempted to traverse the dual star tightrope. Football is county’s unchallenged kingpin but he has coped so far thanks to the commitment to compromise and communication between the two management teams. With fixtures falling on the same day, the league was always going to make or break his dual ambitions but he fought through it and has emerged relatively unscathed.

The workload has been considerable. Training with the footballers has sucked in three or four nights of his week for months now and he has been clocking another evening with the hurlers to boot. A recent civil engineering graduate, he has been lucky to have the backing of an understanding boss but he is still only 23 and the view is that the dual role is not something a player can keep up indefinitely.

“If you have a lot of work and family commitments, I could see that being the case. With Longford in Division Four the commitment wouldn’t be as great as if you were playing in Division One. Still, our hurling season runs until July with the Lory Meagher Cup and then you have the league as well but as long as you are winning you don’t mind playing and you would hope it stretches for as long as it can.”

If the Division Three NFL table is any indicator, Hannon won’t have to split his loyalties for too long but he invites you to dig a little deeper through their spring campaign.

“We were there or thereabouts in a lot of matches, especially against Limerick. We felt we should have taken that game, we had the chances, and the biggest loss we had was by three points. So, there was very little between all the teams and it gives you great hope when you see the likes of Antrim and Sligo going straight up from Division Four and you had Tipp going straight to Division Two as well.

“Look at Down, they were a Division Three team not so long ago and now they’ve gone straight up to Division One. It just shows that if you get it together there is very little in it.”

A midfielder or half-forward with the hurlers, Hannon is corner-back with the footballers but the attention right now is on their forward line.

Brian Kavanagh, a former All Star and their billboard attacker, is named in tomorrow’s tie despite suffering a broken bone in his ankle last month and Paul Barden is entering another summer surrounded by talk of his fitness rather than his talent.

With that in mind, younger men like Francie McGee will shoulder a disproportionate share of the burden for scores in Portlaoise but Hannon is of the belief that the well runs deeper than some might think. A small handful of the panel have experienced the rigours of the Sigerson Cup and, in Glenn Ryan, there is a manager whose own playing record has demanded immediate and unwavering respect.

Louth come to the table with a fast-running game and glimmers of hope after two encouraging O’Byrne Cup campaigns but Hannon is confident of success even if victory tomorrow will bring its own difficulties.

“Unfortunately, if we are successful against Louth I wouldn’t be able to play the first round of the Lory Meagher as that is fixed for June 5 which is the same day as the football quarter-final. It is a nice problem to have. As long as we are winning, that is all I am worried about.”