Kelly puts it on the line for beloved Tipperary

EOIN KELLY of Tipperary has been battling a back problem this season — an injury so severe he’s had a series of epidurals, the pain-killing injections given to women in a difficult labour, just to enable him to take the field.

“I had seven during the season, didn’t play in the league, gave it all the rest I could.

“It’s a career-threatening injury but thankfully it seems to be right this year. Some people have the disc removed, and surgery is always an option, but I didn’t want to go down that road — there are no guarantees and you can still have complications afterwards. I went for the injections, and hopefully it’s all settled down now, I can move on.

“I’ve been doing a lot of flexing exercises, stretching, just to loosen up; all done on your own and all very boring, but I’m hoping it gives me an extra year or two of hurling.”

After a twinge in the back this week, Eoin is battling to avoid yet another epidural on Sunday, but he’ll play. Older brother Paul won’t, though.

Earlier this year Paul was flying until he suffered a bad leg break.

“He’s very frustrated,” Eoin explains. “It was last April he broke the leg, the fibula and the tibia, and he got the plate and the screws in — a spiral break, a bad break.

“He only got the all-clear lately, is on the rehab now, but I doubt he’ll see much action this year — maybe if the club are still going around October, he’ll get back, but that’s it. After the Galway game, he said to me, ‘I’d love to have been involved in that today,’; unfortunate, but it comes with the territory, doesn’t it? Paul is 30 now, the years are creeping up; frustrating, an awful injury to get, but he’ll bounce back from it.”

And that’s the thing — bouncing back. It’s not as if these guys have nothing else to worry about either — they also have jobs, work duties to fulfil, and in this climate those jobs are precious.

“The job has to come first,” says Eoin; “I’m with Bank Of Ireland Finance (as is Henry Shefflin, by the way) and I’m lucky, they’re very accommodating as far as time off goes — if you pick up an injury and need treatment, or need a day off for anything special, there’s never any problem. But we’re far from being professional hurlers, that’s for sure.”

What keeps them all going of course is the lure of glory, an All-Ireland title. Eoin got a taste very early in his career, back in 2001, but the promise of more never materialised, and Cork (2) and Kilkenny especially (6) have dominated since then.

Now there’s themselves, and of course there’s Waterford.

“After what happened to Waterford two years ago, hammered in an All-Ireland final, they could have turned around and said — to hell with this. They didn’t, they stuck with it, got to the Munster final last year, won it this year.

“The thing about Waterford this year, they seem to be fitter and stronger than ever, better conditioned, and this is all under Davy (Fitz). Against Cork, in extra-time, there was Tony Browne coming out with the ball time after time, as fresh as when the game started — you have to compliment Davy for all that. Tactically too they’ve been very good this year. All the talk about Cork after the Tipp match was the long ball in to Aisake — they dealt well with that, didn’t they? They seemed to have really tightened up, gone very tactical, and this will probably be a very tactical game.

“They have probably one of the meanest defences in the championship; before, Waterford would outscore you but they’d probably struggle in defence — not this year, they’re very well organised.

“We have great respect for Davy, his drive and his passion — that’s what he bases his game on, that’s his ethos, and he’s carried that to Waterford. The only thing now is that we’re after getting a bit of experience in Croke Park, having knocked around there for the last couple of years.

“But then you look at Waterford — they were there in 2002, in 04, 06, 07, 08. They have won more big games in Croke Park than Tipperary have over the last 10 years, so you have to respect that too. We have a small bit of experience, they have massive experience.”

Big game in prospect then?

“You’d hope so, but look, we were beaten by them two years ago up there so we don’t care what kind of game it is now, as long as we come out on the right side of the result. One point, that will do us.”