RICHIE HOGAN HAS claimed that All-Ireland hurling champions Kilkenny don’t do tactics.
Speaking to Newstalk earlier, the Danesfort dynamo also revealed that he hadn’t trained for a month because of back and quad injuries.
It emerged yesterday that Hogan was nursing a serious quad injury before throw-in, and the top of his left leg was heavily strapped during the first half.
“I haven’t trained since maybe the start of August with the lads,” Hogan revealed, before admitting that he had a poor game by his own sky-high standards.
Hogan’s participation ahead of the Waterford semi-final was also in some doubt after he suffered a back injury during a training camp before the game.
And the 27-year-old was also in danger of missing Sunday’s final after suffering his latest injury setback.
Hogan was hauled off with over eight minutes of normal time remaining against Galway but he still played his part, contributing two points as the Cats suffocated their opponents in the second half.
The Noresiders swarmed the middle third of the field and put the clampers on a Galway side that led by three points at half-time.
And yet Hogan insisted that tactics were not a factor as Brian Cody’s all-conquering charges collected a second successive All-Ireland crown.
“We genuinely don’t have any tactics and I’ve been saying it for a long time.
“You can’t have tactics because you can get round tactics. You can work around game-plans.
“You can’t beat just pure honest work-rate mixed with a little bit of skill and people working together.
“In the first half, we just weren’t good enough all over the field.
“Every single player was being beaten in his position and it’s even more about doing yourself justice than winning.”
