Austin Flynn: Minding Waterford’s legacy and tradition

A survivor of Waterford’s last All-Ireland win in 1959, Austin Flynn manned the Déise square at a time when his chief responsibility was to ‘protect the goalkeeper from being killed’. His policing was thorough, even when assigned the cases of greats such as Nickey Rackard, Liam Devaney, and Christy Ring, who became a great friend as much as foe.

In his second coming as a Waterford hurler, Austin Flynn, who tonight receives a Hall of Fame gong at the Munster Council’s annual awards ceremony in the Fota Island Resort Hotel, won an All-Ireland medal, a National League medal, three Munster medals, and a Railway Cup medal.

It was quite the era, the Déise’s greatest, and he was an integral part of it at full-back.