‘They’ve taught us an absolute lesson before’

THE removal of heavyweight forces like Ballyhale Shamrocks and Birr has blown the Leinster senior club hurling race wide open.

After recently acquiring their fourth successive Dublin SHC crown, Ballyboden St Enda’s can feel entitled to believe they are in a strong position in the province after a series of concerted attempts to claim honours in recent campaigns.

But while their past conquerors may no longer be participating, club manager Liam Hogan is still extremely cautious ahead of tomorrow’s trip to Nowlan Park for a semi-final date with new Kilkenny kingpins, O’Loughlin Gaels.

“People are talking about Ballyhale and Birr being gone, but that’s seriously underestimating O’Loughlin Gaels and Oulart-the-Ballagh,” said Hogan.

“For instance, there are only two teams who have given us an absolute lesson in hurling over the last few years.

“One is Portumna in a challenge game in Erril in Laois this year and the other was against O’Loughlin Gaels in 2008.

“They came up to our pitch in Firhouse without Martin Comerford and handed us a lesson.

“At half-time the score was 2-11 to 0-4, and it was only when they emptied their bench that we made some semblance of a rally.

“Now look at their form this year, they’ve beaten the reigning All-Ireland champions Ballyhale Shamrocks and then a fancied Carrickshock team in the final.”

Hogan appreciates the magnitude of the challenge ahead of his players but is hopeful that the changes to their training schedule this year will benefit them.

“Earlier on in the year, we gathered in Blessington in March and we all agreed that we had left ourselves down badly in the Leinster championship over the previous two years against Birr and Ballyhale Shamrocks.

“We decided we’d give it one right crack this year while realising that we needed to obviously win Dublin first. We geared our season towards peaking at this time of year so we just kept things ticking over early in the year and then started our hard training in early August when our Dublin county players returned to us.

“That probably conspired to our form not being sharp in the group stages in early September, but we then hit strong form for the county semi-final and final.

“Certainly achieving the four-in-a-row was a very special achievement.

“It was a long time since any Dublin club had achieved it. The target of ours was first and foremost to win the Dublin championship, but certainly there was a great feeling amongst everyone in the club to claim the four-in-a-row.

“But now we’ve moved on. It’s probably helped our cause that our senior footballers were not involved so late this year as our dual players last year had a really tough schedule playing eight or nine weekends in a row.”

The arrival of Wexford senior Stephen Nolan has also bolstered Ballyboden’s cause with his authoritative display from centre-back being a crucial element in their Dublin final success over St Vincents.

“Stephen has been great, and not just for his ability on the pitch but the leadership that he has showed on and off the pitch.

“He’s a very likeable character and everyone took to him from the very first night at training where he made a point of getting to know everyone’s name.

“He’s always encouraging our younger players in training and on the pitch during matches. Definitely, he has been a big addition to our setup.”