James 'Bomber' Hickey: Kilmallock 'just live and die for hurling'

Kilmallock coach Noel Mackey, left, and manager James Hickey. Pic: Tom Beary/Sportsfile

Kilmallock manager James “Bomber” Hickey hailed the never-say-die attitude of his players as they finished with aplomb to see out this Limerick SHC final victory.

The Cratloe man had faith his team would deliver in the closing quarter based on their previous performances. Kilmallock became the first team to lift the John Daly Cup with a 100% record since Adare in 2008 and the only side to have a perfect championship return in the modern group format era.

“We were slow to get going but, I don't know, maybe we were a bit nervous,” he said of The Balbec going 0-5 to 0-0 inside the first 10 minutes before they won the second quarter by seven points. “Maybe we got things wrong in the dressing room. Maybe we had the lads too wound up.

"We had a lot of work done on Na Piarsaigh. A lot of the scores that they've conceded this year would have come between minute 17 and minute 30 again so we knew if we hung in there that we would finish strong.

“Another big thing with us too was we played six championship games and from minute 45 to full-time we've outscored teams 3-34 to 2-19 before today so we had a lot of good reference points all year.” 

Long after the final whistle, Hickey, who followed in Tony Considine and Ger “Sparrow” O’Loughlin’s footsteps in guiding Kilmallock to county glory, was emotional.

“I’ve worked an awful lot with Davy (Fitzgerald) and he always would have said to me after games that it's the outpouring of emotion. That was the one thing today that I got to experience. I see people come out like players crying, young people crying.

“It's just a great outpouring for the team and a town that are so connected. They just live and die for hurling. They just enjoy being in each other's company. They just really kind of just get behind each other.” 

Former Limerick player Oisín O’Reilly was immense in the closing stages, scoring a goal, winning a free converted by Pierce Connery and then the distraction for Graeme Mulcahy’s goal.

“If I'm being honest, Oisín is probably his own worst critic,” said Hickey. “He was really disappointed with the way he played in the semi-final but I knew all week he was going to flourish.

“I don’t know, his wrist could be in bad bother but he was never say die. I think that was the biggest thing today, a never-say-die attitude and we really brought that from minute 1 to minute 63.”