Home-schooled Tobin prepared for toughest exam of them all

It’s less than five years since Limerick last met Kilkenny in a championship game, the All-Ireland final of 2007.

But in a sign of the rapidly changing times on Shannonside, of the starting 15 that September day only Seamus Hickey, Donal O’Grady and Brian Geary remain on the panel for the All-Ireland quarter-final this Sunday in Thurles (4pm).

One of the many new and exciting faces on the Limerick team is corner-forward Seánie Tobin who, along with Graeme Mulcahy in the other corner, will offer a dangerous twin threat to Kilkenny.

“It shows the way the game is going,” said Tobin. “More and more a young man’s game, constantly changing, a lot of fresh faces. From the Kilkenny point of view [they have eight changes], because they’ve been winning so much at every level it’s easier for them to bring on new players. Ourselves, we have a lot of good young players. We’re hungry for it, no confidence issues.”

Certainly no confidence issues for Tobin at any rate, a refreshingly open character currently in the middle of exams with a year to go to qualify as a tax consultant with Keogh Somers in Limerick city. Neither he nor Graeme are particularly big but both are particularly skilful and also — critical at this level — fast. Which of them is faster?

“It has to be Graeme,” he admitted. “There’s no one faster than him on the panel. He’s like a bullet, no staying with him.”

Against that, however, Tobin does have an advantage over Graeme — a freakish, gazelle-like leap which enables him to play like someone several inches taller.

“I’d probably have to take that one all right!” he laughed, “I’d be good enough in the air for a small fella, a lot of practice when I was a youngster against my brother Pat out in the garage.

“He’d send me in home crying every 10 minutes or so but I’d always come back for more!”

Ah yes, brothers Pat and Kevin, both of whom came on against Kilkenny in that 2007 final, and yet another brother, Willie, who also played for Limerick at underage and intermediate levels.

“They’re all still playing with the club [Murroe-Boher]. Willie is our goalie and captain this year. As youngsters we’d be out the back training all the time, our own All-Ireland finals every day of the week.

“Either the mother or the father would be the referee, whichever one of them was around — tough games.”

No better school for an emerging hurler than to be the runt among older siblings and Tobin’s education continues to this day in the form of brotherly advice.

“After every game we’d have a chat. They’d tell me what I was doing wrong, small things I had to correct, but always helpful. They’ve been there themselves, played in that All-Ireland final of 2007 against Kilkenny, won five All-Ireland U21 medals between them. They can look back now and give me the benefit of their own experience, a definite help.”

They can advise him all they like, however, but nothing prepares an inside forward for what awaits him against Kilkenny, especially in a knockout winner-take-all championship game. If Tobin doesn’t know that now, he’ll certainly know it at 4.05pm on Sunday. He had better be ready to be hit like he’s never been hit, not even in his own backyard all those years ago.

“I suppose it’s something different, something I’ve never experienced before, a new level, a different intensity. But we are ready for it,” he insisted.

“We’re all expecting to be hit hard. If we can keep the ball moving fast that’s the aim, try to cause them problems ourselves, get them thinking about us.”

Attack the best form of defence?

“Exactly. If you don’t take the game to them, if you go in there afraid of Kilkenny, you might as well stay at home. It’s pointless talking about who’s going to win. If we perform to our best then we have a very, very good chance. ”