Galway wounds from 10 All-Ireland final losses reopened

It is 40 years this weekend since Galway returned to hurling’s high altar, their 1975 All-Ireland final appearance bringing to an end the county’s 17-year wait for a September sojourn to Jones Road.

Having edged out Tipperary in the league decider earlier in the year, confidence was brimming out west ahead of the clash with Kilkenny.

In the end, Eddie Keher and company sent the Tribesmen back across the Shannon on their shields. Similar tales of September woe would follow the maroon and white through the 80s, 90s and into the noughties; Galway boasting, by some distance, the worst All-Ireland final record of any hurling county over the past 40 years.