Jackie Tyrrell plays down ‘Al Pacino’ coverage

Kilkenny’s Jackie Tyrrell insists he’s no Al Pacino and has revealed his surprise at the huge coverage his All-Ireland hurling final speech has received.

Injured Tyrrell intervened with a rare team-talk at half-time last September when Kilkenny trailed Galway by three points. It clearly had some effect, as the Cats bossed the second half and ended up winning by four, with team-mate Colin Fennelly claiming the speech was decisive and “absolute amazing”.

But Tyrrell, 33, said the incident has grown “arms and legs... it really did”, and he baulked at comparisons with Pacino’s famous ‘game of inches’ oration in the film Any Given Sunday.