Black and amber jerseys feature prominently in Anthony Cunningham's championship memories. The Galway manager is focused on a fourth All-Ireland final (fifth if you count the 2012 replay) against Kilkenny and a couple of Leinster finals.
It's more than 29 years since he played a prominent role in the famous All-Ireland semi-final coup against the then Leinster champions. Galway named Pearse Piggott at full forward but used him as a third centrefielder. Cunningham was part of a two-man full-forward line with Noel Lane.
In the 25th minute, utilising the pace that made him so lethal, as an attacker he swooped in on a penetrating long ball from Joe Cooney, controlled it on the move and steered it past Kevin Fennelly in the Kilkenny goal.
Cunningham would end the day with 1-3, as Galway recorded a first championship win over Kilkenny in 33 years.
Twelve months later the counties met again in the final and after two dispiriting years of All-Ireland defeats, Galway finally won the title restricting Kilkenny to 0-9 on a wet and troublesome day.
His career ended six years later with another All-Ireland against Kilkenny, this time on the losing side, although he never made an appearance off the bench.
As a manager, he took Galway to a historic first Leinster championship, overwhelming Kilkenny in the final before going on to renew rivalry with the All-Ireland champions in September and eventually losing the first replayed hurling final in 53 years.
Dazzling
He surprised many when, after losing in July’s provincial final to the same county, Cunningham told
Brian Cody
that he’d see him again in September, but after a qualifier campaign of steadily improving form, culminating in the dazzling defeat of Tipperary, he is as good as his word.
He explains that his comments were simply a recognition of the fact that with provincial duties finished, the team could focus on the All-Ireland.
“For us the Leinster championship was over,” he says. “There was a new competition starting. There is no point in being here if you don’t believe you are good enough to win the All-Ireland. If someone says at the start of the year what’s your ambition: for us, it is always the All-Ireland.
“So if you are still in the competition on July 7th, for me it is the same as January 1st. We had gone quite close. There was only three in it in the 62nd minute.
“The big thing that is staring you in the face is that you are in Croke Park, you have played the All-Ireland champions. If you say we are finished for the year, the wheels would come off. You wouldn’t do that. The minute the match is over – the minute the semi-final was over, it was immediate preparation for the final. The only time you can relax is after the final.”
Huge experience
He is a hugely experienced manager. Four years ago, he was in charge of an under-21 All-Ireland victory with Galway before taking over the seniors. In 2012 the hurling final wasn’t even his first All-Ireland replay of the year, having six months earlier led Westmeath football champions Garrycastle all the way to Croke Park, where they came within a whisker of recording a sensational All-Ireland against club kingpins Crossmaglen.
On Sunday he will become the first manager since Cyril Farrell to take charge of Galway in an All-Ireland final for a second time. Unlike three years ago, they will be firm outsiders but Cunningham believes they can follow the example of Kilkenny in 2012.
“Again you learn from Kilkenny. They are the best. They went about their business; they were beaten. They rectified their mistakes.
“It is a challenge, but once you know what the level is, the guys will know themselves in training where their game and fitness is. There is nobody sitting down with these guys trying to drive them. Trying to manage it is the biggest thing and to give everyone games and have the whole thing going in the right direction. There is a standard there and you want to get up to it. The guys drive that.”
After being so open defensively against Tipperary and having been taken for three goals by Séamus Callanan, Galway must cope with the twin threat of Hurler of the Year Richie Hogan and the favourite to succeed him, TJ Reid.
“That is true,” says Cunningham, “but we have got on okay in the Leinster final against top players from Kilkenny. We will need to up that performance because those players are probably the best two players in the country. So much hinges on them and we have to be defensively so much better than we were the last day.”
The incentive to improve is however immense: passing the ultimate test of Anthony Cunningham’s management career.
