Martin Comerford admits he may have jumped gun on Kilkenny retirement

He won six All-Irelands with Kilkenny but there was surely more in Martin Comerford, who has now acknowledged that retiring from the inter-county game in 2011 may have been the ‘wrong’ move.

Comerford was full of emotion at the time, most of it negative, after being beaten out the gates of Croke Park by Clarinbridge on AIB All-Ireland club final day. O’Loughlin Gaels had been leading and in control approaching half-time, only to suffer a second-half shellacking that day and they eventually lost by 12 points.

The double scores defeat followed the pain of losing to Tipperary the previous September when Kilkenny missed out on five All-Ireland titles on the trot. Significantly, Comerford only came on as a sub in that game after falling out of favour with Brian Cody. Thrown into the mixer, all of that combined to make retirement an attractive proposition though six years on, Comerford is still going strong for AIB Leinster club finalists O’Loughlins. As for Kilkenny, they regained the All-Ireland title just four months after his retirement in mid-2011 and claimed another in 2012.