Denis Walsh just avoids clash of the ash

But for a rearrangement, Denis Walsh would have found himself in quite the quandary tomorrow, a victim of his own success.

A day prior to leading Ballygunner to a win over Fourmilewater in last Sunday’s Waterford SHC semi-final, he had guided his own St Catherine’s to a Cork senior camogie final against Milford.

Both games were originally scheduled for tomorrow afternoon only for the latter to be brought forward by 24 hours.

Hectic times for the former Cork hurling and Waterford football manager. Confusing too.

“I’m down in Ballygunner three nights a week give or take and I’m doing the same with St Catherine’s. I’d hate to give you the schedule! Some days I nearly have to pinch myself to remind myself about the tactics I have for each team and not to muddle up the two! If I was doing one of them I would be able to relax a bit more but isn’t it great?”

There have been trying occasions too, though. The tragic passing earlier this month of much-respected Ballygunner clubman and county referee Paul Foley had stunned the parish. The Fourmilewater game was postponed as a mark of respect but Walsh saw how the unit rallied after his funeral.

“We have a lot of mature players involved in the panel and they’re a very close-knit club and Paul was very friendly with a good few of them and he was Shane O’Sullivan’s brother-in-law. In those situations leaders come to the fore and that made my job much easier as well.”

After Pauric Mahony’s broken shin in the opener against Ballyduff Upper in May, Ballygunner have learned how to cushion blows. Keeping Mahony involved in the set-up has been as good for him as it has for his team-mates.

“He’s heavily involved,” says Walsh, “and is always around and if players are in a tough corner during a game he’s over on the sideline. He’s up and down the line. From his point of view, that’s helped him but from the team point of view he’s given them a spur and a lift. The setbacks the club have had, people over the last few weeks have realised you’ve got to take the bull by the horns when it crops up.

“There is a ‘can do’ attitude in Ballygunner. Pauric could have buried his head in the sand and be moaning about it but that was never the case. We’ve had to be versatile this year. We knew straight off this season that Alan Kirwan had retired from the senior team.

“Then you had Wayne Hutchinson who had transferred to Dublin. And then Pauric got knocked out in the first game. We turned things on their head and said we couldn’t be so predictable and that we would be asking fellas to step up.

“The way we’re playing, we kind of freshened it up a little bit.”

Walsh remains ambitious but it’s restricted to Ballygunner and St Catherine’s. At the start of the year when he was putting together his backroom team, he put in a call to a man from outside Ballygunner to see if he could assist him. His reply surprised Walsh.

“He wanted to know what were my ambitions for the future and whether I was using Ballygunner as a stepping stone. I said to him, ‘I’ve been there and done that and this is what I’m concentrating on’. And he never came back to me. That will tell you about fellas. Wasn’t I lucky not to get him!”

Walsh may be an outside manager but he knew as soon as replacing Fergal Hartley what was expected of him.

“Ballygunner and myself have worked out reasonably well so far. If we win on Sunday great; if we lose I maybe will have to take a lot of flack but so be it. I’ve no problem with that. The easier thing to do would manage a team that hasn’t reached a county final in 14 years. This is Ballygunner’s 14th in 16 years.

“I’m a matter of fact guy. That’s my strength or weakness, one or the other. The job has to be done, let’s get it done. Some fellas aren’t going to get game-time, other fellas with. As Jim Gavin said, if you’re not happy you shouldn’t be there. You know the terms and conditions.”

Ballygunner have already beaten Tallow in this championship but Walsh has seen them grow in strength in the knock-out stages and was impressed with them in the early league rounds.

“They were the only unbeaten team well into the summer and then Fourmilewater beat them in the group stages and then we did.

“Really, they were playing the best hurling in Waterford before that and playing very organised under Brendan Coleman. He’s done a great job with them. I’m not blowing them up but we’ve a fair idea what we’re going to get off them.

“They’re going to hold their shape and if you look through their team-sheet they have several ex-inter-county players that have been able to give all their allegiance to the club and that’s paid off from that point of view. Those players have improved as the year have gone on — Tommy Ryan, Paul O’Brien, James Murray, Aidan Kearney... there’s a lot of them there.”