'That will knock him for six' - Hogan feels for Shefflin after Galway KO'd

Galway manager Henry Shefflin during the Leinster SHC match against Dublin. Picture: John Sheridan/Sportsfile

Brian Hogan says Galway being eliminated from hurling championship following a six-point defeat to Dublin on Sunday will have left manager Henry Shefflin reeling.

Galway entered the final round match with a strong chance of reaching the Leinster decider but by the final whistle, their summer was over. 

"That will knock him for six," Shefflin's former Kilkenny teammate Hogan told Dalo's Irish Examiner Hurling Show.

"You could see it in him. Richie O'Neill is with him. The commitment to go up there... They base themselves up there a couple of days a week. They've got small families. 

"No more than the players, they all put their hearts and souls into it. For whatever reason, the season never got going. They never at any stage during the year looked like things were beginning to come together.

"I felt for Henry. It was a big decision for him to go up to Galway. There would have been a contingent in Kilkenny who wouldn't have been happy with the fact that he'd gone outside of Kilkenny and gone to a rival in Galway, not going to what are perceived as one of the weaker counties. He definitely would have taken a big of flak for that.

"He's ambitious. I know that he went up with a full belief that there's an All-Ireland in this group."

Kilkenny's Henry Shefflin, watched by team-mate Brian Hogan, lifts the Liam MacCarthy Cup after the 2012 All-Ireland hurling final against Galway. Picture: Brendan Moran / SPORTSFILE

The defeat to Dublin was Galway's second of the championship, adding to one suffered against Wexford in the third round. 

"Going down to Wexford Park, they were really disappointing," said Hogan.

"This is a Galway team that had aspirations of going deep into the championship. You have to front up at least. To get beaten in the manner they did - comprehensively beaten, 1-28 to 0-23, it almost felt like the towel was thrown in for the last five or ten minutes of that match.

"A weakened Kilkenny came up to Salthill, Galway should have been like, 'Right, we have these lads. We smell blood, let's really make a statement' because I know that would have been the psychology with Kilkenny if the reverse was the case. Kilkenny came away from that match disappointed that they didn't win it."

Hogan believes last year's dramatic defeat to Kilkenny in the Leinster final was a considerable setback in Galway's development. 

"Is it time to bring in younger lads?" said Hogan.

"They would have 50, 60 young players in at the beginning of the season. They would have gone through the Fitzgibbon, looked everywhere. They were at all the club matches last year.

"He's sticking with the older guys, picking the guys that I presume he's seen are performing at club level. He's giving lads a chance in the Walsh Cup and early stages of the league but players haven't put their hands up. There's a continuous inconsistency there."