One day at a time, says selector Fanning

WATERFORD selector Padraig Fanning nods when you ask about observers pointing out his side’s slightly different tactical approach this year.

It’s been commented on a good deal, but the Mount Sion clubman warns that he and the management team take every game as it comes rather than having a fixed approach.

“It’s a game by game approach. There’s a lot made of what we are doing and what we’re not doing. But we’re working very, very hard and we’re all covering each other as much as possible all over the field.

“That’s, in essence, what it comes down to. We take each game as it comes and Tipperary is a different animal coming up to the Cork game and likewise, the Clare game.

“There are different things we have to deal with in each game and we’ll work at looking at it now from here on in.”

Well, seeing as you mentioned them, Tipperary were impressive against Galway... “It was a fantastic match, the Galway-Tipperary match, the way they pulled it out of the fire. They were two points down with time nearly up. They got three scores, more so than a goal, and that shows the potency of the attack. They were fantastic scores and they moved the ball very well.

“You couldn’t but worry about their attack. Shane McGrath, when he went out centre field, turned the game. Seamus Callanan came on and the first thing he did was score a goal. Their forwards move around an awful lot and picked off points from different angles.

“I watched the game again last night and I enjoyed it again – it was super hurling. Their attack is very potent.”

Waterford have weapons of their own, notably in Michael ‘Brick’ Walsh, who’s been peerless at centre-back this year. Are they expecting Tipp to counteract his influence?

“Tipp are no different to ourselves, they’re planning and trying to get their bit of space somewhere. At the moment the whole idea is to minimise that as much as possible. I’m sure Tipp will be looking at certain areas of our team and seeing where they think they can get at us but we’re no different. We’ll have to wait and see.”

Fanning had a special word for the evergreen Tony Browne, though he linked it to the team ethos which all the Waterford players have bought into.

“I was hurling for Mount Sion and you could see Tony just hurling away up through the ranks. There’s a big family there, he has a lot of brothers, and I got to know them all then. When I got to know him first, when he was about 11 or 12 you wouldn’t really notice him. The fact that Tony is still going is great. But he’d be the first to say that it’s not about him.

“He stays away from people talking about him and he’s still hurling well. He’s happy to be hurling well. But that’s the way it is with our team at the moment. If there was any of them in bother they could come to us if they were in bother and likewise with them with me.

“We’d do anything for each other at the moment and that’s important – we have great respect for each other and that makes a massive difference. The lads look up to Tony – Noel Connors said it the last day that he was only a little chap when Tony made his debut. It’s a great mix and it helps.”

Fanning also paid tribute to manager Davy Fitzgerald’s decision to give the older players a different training regime earlier this year.

“Davy looked at it and decided that we would approach it in a different way. But I wouldn’t call it a break. They probably trained more than the other lads did in January – they were doing a lot of stuff on a daily routine.”