Kilkenny know they have no soft centre

Keith Duggan on Kilkenny's James 'Cha' Fitzpatrick, who has repeatedly proven his toughness of character

It is remarkable to consider this is James "Cha" Fitzpatrick's third season with the Kilkenny senior team. In a Gaelic summer when managers have been making positional moves like audacious chess masters, Brian Cody's decision to place the light-footed Ballyhale sensation at centrefield is just a subtle tinkering. But it was clear in the crucial games against Galway and Clare that the new number eight had given Kilkenny a new dimension. And more importantly, Fitzpatrick had found a natural home.

"In the (2005) county final against The Village, we started Cha in at full forward," says senior manager Maurice Aylward, "and he was going a bomb until the possession started to dry up. So we brought him out centre field and he really stood out there.

"The only problem was that we didn't have him inside as well. But Cha always maintained the midfield was his favourite position and we used him more there. Obviously Brian Cody would have seen him flourish and gave him his head there and it has suited him. He is a lovely, elusive player and he likes to have a bit of room to come on to the ball."

The rise of Fitzpatrick has long been preordained and the records of his boyhood hurling life are in accordance with the glittering feats suggestive of a child prodigy.

Back in 1998, the year before Cody took charge of the Black and Amber, Fitzpatrick was the outstanding player at the Féile na nGael and won the skills competition. The same year, he was prominent - along with current senior panellists Eoin Reid and Michael Fennelly - when Ballyhale NS won the Ryan A competition.

After national school, his skills were burnished in St Kieran's College, where more honours followed. He won back-to-back minor medals in 2002 and 2003 and by then he was a key figure on the county under-21 team, captaining the county to All-Ireland success at the age of 19.

Fitzpatrick's is a resume of such ridiculously high, unfaltering accomplishment that the bare statistics are hard to appreciate and suggest a life in which winning was predestined. His success deepens the easy notion of young Kilkenny hurlers doing what they are bred to do, cleaning out all before them. The reality is much different.

Joe Dunphy taught Fitzpatrick from his first day in national school and holds an abiding memory of having to roll the sleeves up on Fitzpatrick's jersey just to free his wrists. He was conspicuously small as a child but fast developed a mature repertoire of skills and had the temperament and belief to apply those in matches.

"He was just a very complete little hurler in the mould of DJ or Henry Shefflin," says Dunphy now. "He had a fine strike off both sides, a great sidestep. There were lots of little aspects of his game, jinks and solo runs and his ability to read the ball that made him stand out.

"And to see him play for Kilkenny now, you can still see the same young hurler and it is very gratifying. And we were fortunate enough to have Henry and Liam and Ger Fennelly as past pupils of the school, so to see Cha following in their footsteps . . . ah, it means a lot. But Cha was dedicated to the game from a very young age. It didn't just happen."

From the outside, it looks as if Fitzpatrick's ascension to the elite ranks of Kilkenny hurlers was a matter of moving through the various rites of passage. It ignores the hours of practice and, more crucially, the expectations placed upon a young man at an early age.

"Certainly, when you are unusually gifted, there are added pressures," agrees Dunphy. "And the media interest does seem to have intensified in recent years. Undoubtedly, many promising players have been unable to cope with the demands of the game at the top level; it has destroyed their game. But there is a tradition in Kilkenny of players coming through to the senior ranks at a young age, Ollie Walsh being an obvious example."

And what about the demands of living in a community like Ballyhale, staunchly hurling-oriented. Surely Fitzpatrick must have felt the anticipation of his friends and neighbours as he began to shine as an adolescent?

"Ah, I don't think so," Dunphy says. "For a start, he's a very relaxed kind of fellow. And he was lucky in that Ballyhale has experienced a lot of hurling success in the past. We have nine county championships and three club championships, and we've produced great players. So Cha would have been aware of that legacy. So I think people wish him well and he is very highly regarded in Ballyhale but in an unobtrusive way."

Last weekend, Fitzpatrick opened the door to Maurice Aylward's house and sat down for a chat. As well as having a manager-player relationship, the pair are neighbours. Aylward hurled with Fitzpatrick's father, Ned, when Ballyhale and Knocktopher diluted their potency by fielding two teams. "Ned was a good, tidy hurler but in stature and, from what I have heard, in style, Cha is supposed to be more like his grandfather."

John Fitzpatrick won a junior All-Ireland in 1928 and was a substitute for the 1932 final against Clare.

"I never saw John hurl," says Aylward, "but he is reputed to have been comparable to Cha, a light, skilful player. And I think Cha would be aware of that legacy. But he grew up with a house that was deeply involved in GAA. He is one of nine children and some of them hurl, some don't. They suffered a very sad loss when their mother passed away with an illness in 2003. And I do think it was a great consolation to the family that Bridget got to see Cha winning a minor medal with Kilkenny.

"That was a very hard time on all the family. But Cha has always been fairly easy-going about his game. He is serious and he is tough about it but he wouldn't be the type to get carried away. He sees himself as a team player rather than an individual, I think."

Fitzpatrick's toughness of character was also apparent after he fought back from a broken collarbone he suffered in the 2004 All-Ireland under-21 final to feature as a substitute for Shamrocks in the south final of the under-21 A championship against The Rower-Inistioge a number of weeks later. His appearance was a surprise and the health of his collarbone was immediately tested with an unceremonious jolt from an opponent. Michael Fennelly and his own brother, Donnacadh, were among the first to arrive in the rescue party but Fitzpatrick was unbothered by the incident and calmly reacquainted himself with the business of winning.

However, it has been suggested the slow-healing collarbone was one of the reasons Fitzpatrick displayed indifferent form at senior level last summer, failing to stamp his personality on the senior team.

Before this year's championship, he told Maurice Aylward he was hell bent on atonement. He still looks disconcertingly boyish, the skinny frame accentuated by the bright yellow helmet. But in the rout of Galway and in the heated exchanges against Clare, he was able to boss the match at times, releasing the combination of economy and cheekiness and confidence on the ball that made his name at underage level.

Although his clubmate Henry Shefflin was in the mood for one of those signature shows of scoring in the All-Ireland semi-final against Clare, the bright, assured play of Fitzpatrick against one of the toughest teams in the land was the other most eye-catching feature of their victory.

"He is deceptive," says Aylward. "He is probably about 5ft 10ins but he manages to look smaller on the field. And he is a great man to pluck a ball out of the sky. He has the footballer's ability to time his leap so he is claiming the ball at the peak of his jump. And although he is not the strongest, he has developed the knack of evading tackles and sidestepping fellows. I think his sidestep may be his greatest single asset.

"He is like a pickpocket, the way he comes in and steals a breaking ball. He was marking Jonathan Clancy against Clare, who is the same loose kind of player, but Cha just settled into his own game and he looked like the player we've seen down the years."

Tomorrow, against the flying and high-scoring Cork midfield, comes yet another crucial test for Fitzpatrick. He is 70 minutes away from adding a senior All-Ireland medal to the jewels he pocketed on his journey to this point. At UCC, Fitzpatrick played alongside Tom Kenny, the dynamic Cork midfielder and arguably the man who throws most coal into the formidable Rebel furnace.

This is an epochal final: Cork bearing down on a three-in-a-row and Kilkenny in their way. With Cork's other midfielder Jerry O'Connor the key man in last year's All-Ireland final and a noted big-game performer, the slender young man from Ballyhale will be at the heart of the narrative tomorrow. And with perfect timing, Cha Fitzpatrick may be about to come of age.