Conor Kenny: Borris-Ileigh happy to wear the underdog tag

Conor Kenny believes the underdog tag suits Borris-Ileigh.

The Tipperary and Munster champions have defied the bookmakers time and again since defeating Drom-Inch in a county quarter-final last October.

And Kenny has no issues with them being ranked as outsiders for their AIB All-Ireland Club final with Ballyhale Shamrocks on January 19.

“I think it suits us being underdogs,” suggests Kenny.

“I think ever since the county quarter-final we’ve been underdogs. We don’t read into that at all. We know what’s inside the four walls of the dressing room. We’ve great heart and good hurlers as well so it’s about going out there and doing ourselves justice.

“None of us have played in an All-Ireland final and Ballyhale have the trump card on us there.

“They know the ground, they know the route, they know the field. Not many of our lads have played in Croke Park. At the end of the day, it’s a hurling game and a hurling field.

“You can build it up all you want but it’s just a hurling field. All we want to do is perform. There’s no point in going up there and not giving a performance. We’ll knuckle down now and do a bit of homework on them, where they’re strong and where we can get at them but it’s just about going there and trying to perform.”

There’s almost a sense of disbelief in the group considering where they came from four months ago — beaten by eight points by Kiladangan in a divisional final last September.

“It wasn’t too long ago that we were beaten in a North final by Kiladangan and well beaten,” recalls co-captain Kenny. “I remember going back to training the following Saturday and saying, ‘What’s going to happen to us?’

“We just had a meeting and cleared the air and said we would take one game at a time and this is where the journey has taken us now to Croke Park. I just can’t wait. We know the task ahead of us but it’s something we’ll relish.

It’s the stuff of dreams to go there with your club especially this team. I never thought at the start of the year we would have ended up in Croke Park. I would have thought you were mad if you told me that.

Former Kildare hurler Kenny says training through the Christmas period benefitted the team as they dismissed St Thomas’ in Sunday’s semi-final.

“It probably would have been a bit different to previous years when you mightn’t have known whether to have a break over the Christmas. Our situation was fairly straightforward — we just stayed training. We played Kerry, we played UL in challenge games and were performing well.

“We knew what it was going to take to be on our game and thankfully we were.”