Laois progress faces toughest test to date in Kilkenny

LEINSTER UNDER-21 HC FINAL

THE BEST hurler in Laois, Willie Hyland, recently went on record to state the sport had reached an all-time low in the county.

A heavy beating in tonight’s Leinster decider against Kilkenny in Portlaoise (7.30pm) would support that assertion, but right now Laois are in this provincial final on merit.

They beat the defending champions Dublin in the quarter-final. It happened and it was deserved. The 2-14 to 0-17 scoreline was real. Granted, they were poor in the semi-final, seeing off Carlow by a single point.

The manager Tony Doran explained the problem. Seven of the players were on the senior panel, who were removed from the championship by Limerick on June 23rd. They shipped 6-21, scoring 1-11, 1-10 of which belonged to Hyland, hence his outburst a week later.

“In the weeks between the Dublin game and Carlow game the seniors were still involved in the qualifiers so we didn’t have our hands on the players as much as we would have liked,” said Doran. “Semi-finals are hard but we were delighted to get out on the right side of it.”

There were also two players doing the Leaving Cert, one of whom was the highly-regarded Bill Duggan, who lines out at centre back tonight.

Focusing on the Dublin performance rather than the Carlow showing, Laois should be competitive tonight and, just maybe, Hyland was wrong. The Dublin victory came just after the Laois seniors were tanned 3-23 to 1-7 by the same county on June 2nd.

“After the lashing the seniors got it wasn’t going to come around a second time, I can tell you that,” Doran continued. “It was just about intensity levels. When the crowd got behind us going in for half-time it just lifted every single one of them. They came out for the second half knowing they had a 16th man.”

This evening’s game was switched from Nowlan Park to O’Moore Park so hope springs eternal that something similar may occur.

The facts say otherwise. Kilkenny, with Cillian Buckley included at wing forward having been in midfield against Galway in last Sunday’s Leinster final, are going through a mini-drought at this age grade. Their 23rd title came back in 2009 and they have not been in a final these past two years. Laois’ last under-21 final was 1990, with their only success coming in 1983.

Hyland’s recent comments stick in the mind. He spoke of walking away unless something fundamental was done to the coaching structures to halt the succession of heavy defeats.

Doran is well placed to state whether a complete upheaval of current structures is required.

“Everybody is entitled to their opinion on it. That is Willie’s opinion. Okay, maybe things need to be shuffled up a little bit and changed but at the end of the day if you can get commitment out of players. When I rang all these players back in February, March not one of them said no. Every single one of them wants to be a part of where we are going to.

“The first thing we have to do is get every single player of county quality hurling with our county team. Hopefully these players will see there is positive stuff coming through and will come back in with us.”

With Kilkenny, Doran concedes, comes a different standard of hurling. John Power, brother of Richie, continues a rich tradition in that family this evening, while Walter Walsh is another capable of destroying Laois on his own.

Everything must go right for Laois, with the reliable placed ball accuracy of Stephen Maher not enough to engineer victory.

Really, it will take something special. The likelihood is that it will come from black and amber hurlers.

LAOIS: E Fleming; P Flynn, G Burke, A Phelan; J Fitzpatrick, B Duggan, N Unwin; D Freeman, B Dunne; W Dunphy, P Lawlor, S Maher; B Reddin, N Foyle, D King.

KILKENNY: D Walsh; J Corcoran, W Phelan, B Kennedy; L Harney, R Doyle, J Lyng; G Brennan, O Walsh; K Kelly, P Walsh, C Buckley; W Walsh, J Power, G Aylward.