Fintan O'Toole

IT IS JUST short of ten months now since Pauric Mahony officially pulled the plug on his time as a Waterford hurler.

The inter-county game had governed his life for 12 seasons, but in late January he confirmed that it was no longer for him.

There had been a sense that winter he was on the cusp of moving on. Ballygunner manager Darragh O’Sullivan met his nephew around that time on Thyestes Chase day, Gowran Park’s flagship race meeting. At the Kilkenny track, he watched Mahony have a few drinks with friends, enjoying the shift in pace after years pounding the county hurling treadmill.

If the change was welcome, there has not been a complete disconnect from the sport. Instead Mahony has had the capacity to channel all his energies towards the club cause.

He finished up yesterday on the Ennis Road in Limerick with 0-11 to his name. It may not have touched the heights he scaled in the 2022 instalment of the Ballygunner-Na Piarsaigh rivalry, Mahony shot the lights out with 0-13 that day, seven points mined from open play.

But his input yesterday was also invaluable. It was a trying afternoon for players trying to score from open play. Of the 1-25 the two teams scored, only a combined 1-10 came from play. Ballygunner hit eight points of that tally and Mahony rifled over three of those. Dessie Hutchinson was the only other Ballygunner forward on the mark from play, reflective of a tight and tense game where space was choked by highly-organised defences and a tricky November wind threw the striking of elite forwards off-kilter.

Mahony’s shooting was not flawless. He was two from four in the placed ball opportunities that arose in the first ten minutes, knocking one against the upright and flighting another wide. Two other frees went amiss in the second half but he still chalked up six points from frees, nailed a pair of ’65s and elevated his performance with those scores from play.

In the 35th minute a ball whipped on the ground out of the Na Piarsaigh defence was gathered by Mahony, he shaped to shoot off his left, stepped inside a tackler and rifled over a right-handed shot from 65 yards. Ten minutes left he hoovered up a break off a puckout to launch over a left-handed point.

Approaching 51 minutes on the clock, Mahony popped over a close-range free and then when Shane Dowling sent the resultant puckout towards Mike Casey, it was the Ballygunner number 11 who raced across to block an intended pass from the Limerick All-Ireland winning defender, gathering possession and knocking over a score.

It brought to mind a passage of play in the second half of Ballygunner’s quarter-final win over Sarsfields. The Waterford champions were 11 points to clear in the final quarter, the sense of contest was over against the Cork opponents, when Mahony coughed up the ball on the right wing of the attack.

It looked a lost cause as Sarsfields came out of defence but he immediately chased back to apply the pressure that saw Patrick Fitzgerald draw a foul for a free that Mahony calmly converted.

When Mahony’s scoring tally was put to his manager yesterday, the swerve in topic of conversation was telling.

“I don’t know what he scored but his work rate was infectious all over the field,” said O’Sullivan.

“When you’ve a guy like that, working hard – but then look at Peter Hogan. How hard did he work? The man was out on his feet. Mikey Mahony – the one he turned over at the end, Kevin (Mahony), Dessie (Hutchinson), all of them. That’s what they do. It’s ingrained in them at this stage. We have to keep that work rate the same the next day. That’s the reality.”

That is the template for Ballygunner’s performances but the scoring class that Mahony applies is critical. Aside from his free-taking duties, his capacity to drift into those pockets of space around the middle, his sense of timing to seize breaks and his efficiency in open play, are all vital ingredients. 

As is his experience. His first taste of a Munster senior club final was back in 2009, a teenager fresh off a Munster minor winning run that summer with Waterford. Ballygunner lost that game to Newtownshandrum and Mahony had to soak up disappointment at missing the 2015 final with a broken shin that wrecked his season and then suffering another defeat to Na Piarsaigh in 2017.

Twelve months later brought deliverance with his 1-6 tally helping defeat their nemesis from Limerick, yet the turbulence continued with a final reversal at the hands of Borris-Ileigh in 2019 as he scored five points and a torn cruciate in October 2020 that laid waste to another campaign.

But Mahony’s capacity for regeneration has been striking. In January 2022 he shot 0-7 as Ballygunner smashed Kilmallock to win the previous season’s final and then followed it up last December with a 0-10 return as they surged past Ballyea to complete back-to-back Munster titles.

Ballygunner fitted an All-Ireland win in between those Munster victories in 2022 yet the year ended on a low note as they surrendered that national title to Ballyhale Shamrocks.

The Kilkenny powerhouse lost their recent county final and coupled with the storming form of Ballygunner, the Waterford champions have seen their favourite status for the All-Ireland harden.

Within their camp the focus will be solely on the looming challenge of Clonlara.

And the guiding hand of Mahony, their point-scoring, creative attacker in chief, will continue to stand out.