WHEN THE GREAT Kerry football team were coming to the end of their ultimately-doomed attempt at five All-Irelands in a row in the early ‘80s, they embarked on a series of challenge matches up north to raise funds for some lavish round-the-world team holidays.
Wherever they went, they had scarlet carpet rolled out and were fed and watered with the finest of wines and meats, to the point when they could have been sponsored by Gaviscon.
At the back ends of these trips, they were put up against whatever a county could gather up for the evening. Chumps to the slaughter.
The expectations were implicit. Kerry felt they were on a touring jamboree and the shoulder-length hair was being truly let down. But the locals wanted their pound of flesh and for them to hold up their end of the bargain.
In a most un-GAA like fashion, they wanted Kerry to show what they had got. Put on a bit of a show. Thrash the locals. Give the people what they wanted.
Goes without saying that the world is different now. There is an enormous effort in terms of finance, expertise and commitment going into making Antrim hurling a competitive force. None of their support would have wished for a 17-point tanking yesterday.
But all the same, all eyes were on one man. TJ.
He might have two first names but he has the fame of a Cher, Bertie etc where the surname is unnecessary.
In Corrigan Park, scores of children ran towards him as hard as they could at the final whistle; early arrivals at Woodstock looking to claim the best possible view of Jimi Hendrix.
Every so often, a child would emerge from the scrum, this ‘TJ-Fest,’ if you will, and run towards their parents or friends, instantly boasting about the signature on the bás of their hurley.
After half an hour, there was little let up. One wonders if the famous Kilkenny kitman Denis ‘Rackard’ Cody hasn’t stitched a pocket into TJ’s shorts to house a few Sharpie markers.
In an alternate Universe, if Antrim had won, the supporters might have been running in a different direction.
It so happens that Antrim once beat Kilkenny on this pitch in championship hurling. It was 1 August, 1943 and the scoreline at the end read Antrim 3-3 Kilkenny 1-6 in the All-Ireland semi-final.
It wasn’t that they came without warning. Galway had been dispatched in the All-Ireland quarter-final at the same venue.
The Connacht side looked almost home by two points when a sideline cut by Noel Campbell carried all the way into the square and clipped the underside of the crossbar to send the large crowd into raptures.
There was background to it too. A youth policy such as it was, had been in place.
Sammy Mulholland and John Butler from Ballycastle had played on the 1940 minor team that beat Laois in the All-Ireland semi-final and they turned in a credible performance in the final losing to Limerick 6-4 to 2-4.
All the same, Antrim had been hurling at Junior level up until 1943 and were only granted admission to the senior grade due to the wartime restrictions on travel at the time.
If there was a slackness in the Kilkenny camp, it wasn’t through logistics. They travelled to Belfast on the Friday ahead of a Sunday game. On the bus, they had no less than nine of the team that played in the ‘Thunder and Lightning Final’ four years earlier.
Yarns that have grown legs and tails down through the years suggest that the Kilkenny team were treated to some fine Belfast hospitality, leading to dicky tummies among the camp. Either way it was a sporting sensation of its’ time.
The legacy of that win was the building of Casement Park. A local farmer by the spectacular name of Hoppy Dobbins, granted Antrim GAA a bit of his acreage and the county board raised the sum of £100,000 to build stands. Ten years later, Casement Park opened its’ doors.
Funny, in a way, that this game falls on the same weekend when the British Government have made a promise to fill in the funding shortfall that will eventually rebuild Casement Park in time for the Euro 2028 tournament.
Back to TJ.
As he went in on the square at the start, he was met with Dunloy’s Ryan McGarry; who was named on the AIB club hurling Team of the Year.
In the first play he chopped on Reid, and Reid popped his first free over on 33 seconds.
From Ryan Elliott’s puckout, Alan Murphy leaped and caught. The ball was delivered from Tom Phelan to John Donnelly and then onto Martin Keoghan to pick his spot in the net. You could end up sounding silly with statements like these, but the game already felt over.
On four minutes, with the benefit of the wind, Kilkenny goalkeeper Eoin Murphy went long. Reid had wandered out the pitch a little, but he was completely unimpeded as he rose and caught the delivery. He sauntered goalwards and dispatched the shot to the net.
And really, on it went like that. With his size, he is able to keep his left handed swing miles away from despairing blocks and yet with all that size his feet are nimble and balletic which leads him to win so many balls dribbling on the grass.
Even in the second half when you felt he might have been entitled to ease off a small bit, he grafted hard. A ball played inside had McGarry reading it better but when he tried to feint past Reid along the sideline, he was caught with a hip to shoulder challenge that could shift small cars. Sideline to Kilkenny.
With just two minutes left, a movement through Walter Walsh and Eoin Cody left the ball at Reid’s feet. He executed a ground stroke to the net on a day when his range of skills were given the time and space to showcase them.
And then on the final whistle, the adoration began in earnest.