ALL-IRELAND SHC SEMI-FINAL WATERFORD v TIPPERARY: Gavin Cummiskeyon the lengths coach Davy Fitzgerald has gone to to instil a winning mentality in his Waterford charges, invloving everyone from top conditioner Ger Hartmann to champion boxer Bernard Dunne
DAVY FITZGERALD took the small gathering of reporters into a quiet corner of the Burlington hotel. It was the first Monday morning in September. It was 2008.
The Waterford team he had inherited three months previously were beaten the previous afternoon in a deeply unsettling manner. This easy to admire group, having enlivened the Munster hurling landscape since 2002, had finally reached an All-Ireland final only for the scoreboard to read a horrific 3-30 to 1-13 afterwards.
They were filleted by Kilkenny.
They went away but, thankfully, they come again – refusing to let the spectre of that day become their ultimate legacy.
“We have got two choices now in the GAA world,” said Fitzgerald on that sullen morning nearly two years ago.
“Either sit down and let them do what they are doing to us, or try and come up and match it some way or another. I’d like to be a part of it. Trying to figure it out in the next year or two. Trying to deal with that.”
The man is true to his word. Fitzgerald has been off learning new methods to practice this ancient game and, most importantly, he is still here.
Remarkably, so is Tony Browne, and Dan Shanahan too. Even Ken McGrath’s creaking joints are clinging on to a once-glorious hurling career.
Of course, John Mullane keeps on keeping on.
The 2008 final is part of the Waterford hurlers’ psyche now. It was crushing but they sucked in that pain and are trying to use it constructively.
They have done this, but is it enough?
In the 2009 All-Ireland semi-final – after jolting Galway in the last eight – Waterford got another chance against Kilkenny. They stayed the pace with greatness, eventually trailing off to lose by five points.
The men with Munster medals jangling in their pockets refused to let the dam burst a second time.
Now, for hurling’s sake, we hope they have moved on again. But Kilkenny are irrelevant this weekend.
It was a young Tipperary group that provided the sternest test for the five-in-a-row chasers in last season’s thrilling finale.
It is Tipperary who recovered from the deceptive Cork burst of early summer and it is they who look best armed to halt Kilkenny’s seemingly relentless march through their Pyrenees (even if their Hannibal’s cruciate ligament has snapped).
No, this is not about Kilkenny but it is always about them when hurling matters are raised. Brian Cody admitted tomorrow’s precursor is “one of the nicest games you could ever go to, the second All-Ireland semi-final after winning the first one”.
It will not be “nice”. It will be full-blooded. It must be. If Waterford can hold off Father Time, it is further evidence that Davy Fitz has grasped his second chance.
That he has found a new way.
Undoubtedly eccentric along the sideline, the former Clare goalkeeper possesses a deep-thinking, tactical mind.
It started with a winter/spring mission to the world-renowned (certainly in athletics) University of Limerick-based physical therapist Ger Hartmann.
“I suggested going to Ger early in the year and working on it that way – coming from a new approach, I think that helped as well.
“I would discuss a lot of the things I do with Ger Hartmann, especially when it comes to the older players and getting the best out of them.
“He is not around the best international athletes for nothing, you know. He has to know what their bodies are able for and what they are not able for. That’s why I went to him.
“I think the boys appreciate he has been a massive help to them. It has contributed to their mental state as well.
“It’s the exercises he gets them to do in order to perform. I buy into that, once I can understand the why about something I don’t have a problem.
“I don’t just let Ger Hartmann off – we would spend hours talking about exactly what they are doing and why they will get the benefit out of it. (After that) I one hundred per cent let it go. I have to say, Ger Hartmann and Ger Keane have been absolutely first class.
“I remember there was a hand-over day in March up in UL when I got the boys back. We had the Munster (rugby) conditioner in for a session to see what kind of shape they were in.
“They had to go through this test and then we had a questions and answers session – there were things said and done. It was very open.”
Then they drove on. Keeping the old guard intact was not a massive act of persuasion on Fitzgerald’s part. There is unfinished business.
“Well, I didn’t have to twist their arms. We would have had a good chat about it but these guys love playing hurling. They love being involved, so they do. They are mad for a role.”
Former super bantamweight world champion Bernard Dunne is part of the Waterford backroom this season. Dunne is a good friend of Davy Fitz, having met through Clare businessman and Irish sporting patron Martin Donnelly.
They have drawn from Dunne’s undulating boxing career as it is not so dissimilar to their own. Dunne was viciously felled by Kiko Martinez in 2007. It took 86 seconds for his European belt to be stripped from his waist. Kilkenny dismantled Waterford in 22 minutes.
The difference between the boxer and the Waterford hurlers story is Dunne returned, bypassed European opponents, having dug deep into himself to become a physical specimen capable of winning the WBA super bantamweight world title in 2009 when knocking out the Panamanian Ricardo Cordoba in a dramatic 11th round.
It took him two years to recover and improve.
“I say it to the guys,” explains Fitzgerald, “the Kiko defeat made sure of him winning a world title because while it knocked him for six, in my opinion, it built his resolve even higher again.
“I have got knocked two or three times in my life and it made me stronger. When I got hurt I made sure to use that hurt to take a big positive out of it.
“The reason I like having Bernard around is I want an attitude in the Waterford set-up that we’ll never give in. We’ll always fight to the bitter end. I like to think I epitomise that; and Bernard epitomises that.
“I want the team to feed off that. It is not what we say or what we do it is just the way we did it ourselves.”
Others have contributed. It has not just been Davy, Ger Hartmann and Bernard Dunne guiding Waterford to a fourth Munster title since their breakthrough in 2002 (when, incidentally, they beat Tipperary in a typically hectic provincial final).
But first and foremost it is the hurlers themselves who have maintained genuine contenders’ status for the past decade. Now they must deal with the team that has come closest to felling Kilkenny in last season’s gripping September decider.
“There is no doubt Tipp are a special team. They showed that in the All-Ireland last year. Saying that, we’ve met twice in championship over the last number of years – they’ve won one, we’ve won one. Certainly we are going to have to be at our best, be aware of all their forward movement and going against a very solid backline. But we are looking forward to the challenge, we’re not bad ourselves.”
Neither Davy Fitz nor the Waterford team have stood still. Decent underage graduates have been funnelled on to the panel, making Ken and Dan (still the man) Shanahan “mere” panellists, forced to adopt new leadership roles behind the scenes.
“Dan and Ken, they go around to players before games. I appreciate that, one hundred per cent, as it has to be hard not being starters. They have been the main guys in the set-up for years. They are a big part in how Waterford got so successful. I think that is very hard but they are phenomenal inside in the dressingroom.
“Dan would probably be thick enough with me that he is not playing but if you ask me straight about Dan Shanahan: he gives his all at training, he is probably one of the most committed guys we have. He got a tough time after the Justin thing two years ago.
“I actually like Dan a lot. I probably wouldn’t show it to him all the time but I do have good time for him. I was happy for him to come and score that goal the last day (against Cork).”
That Waterford could win another Munster crown tells us plenty about their strength of character and evolved hurling style.
Now it must come out again. Shanahan and McGrath may see game time, the Waterford script remains incomplete without their cameos, but it is for others to stand up now.
“We probably took a bit of stick last year. We had to knock the team and build it right back up. The only way you can see the true potential of a player is to give him a few games. You can’t judge him on bits and pieces.
“I did that, took a few chances, but I felt I had to do it.
“They have shown super character, especially after the defeat two years ago, to come back and win a Munster title, especially against Cork in a replay in extra-time. It was a special thing to do.
“We parked that bus and are just thinking ahead to Tipperary.”
