IN JANUARY 2020, James O’Connor watched on from the sideline as his Fr O’Neill’s team went down to Tullaroan in the All-Ireland club intermediate hurling final. 

It was a thrilling game at Croke Park, finishing 3-19 to 5-12, one that the Cork club led by five points with 15 minutes to go.

But by the fourth minute of injury-time, Kilkenny great Tommy Walsh stroked over the winning score to deliver the title for Tullaroan.

Of course, much has changed in the intervening 23 months since those pre-Covid days.

On the hurling front, O’Connor now finds himself in charge of Kilkenny senior champions Ballyhale Shamrocks. He enjoyed a far happier outing on Jones’ Road yesterday when his team completed the Leinster three-in-a-row. 

“It’s funny how things work out,” he remarked after the one-sided 6-23 to 0-14 win over Clough-Ballacolla.

“I stood in the middle of that field two years ago after losing to Tullaroan in an intermediate All-Ireland final and I was saying to myself it was a chance gone.

“We were beaten by a point after a brilliant game of hurling. I said to myself that day I would get back here some way or other. Two years later, I’m back again with Shamrocks. Unbelievable story.”

Having replaced legendary figure Henry Shefflin before the 2020 campaign, O’Connor has now delivered back-to-back Kilkenny titles and a provincial crown.

Ballyhale head for an All-Ireland semi-final in the New Year. In 2022 the club celebrate their 50th anniversary and O’Connor admits winning their third straight All-Ireland would be even more special in such a landmark year. 

“It’s a massive deal, being honest with you. It’s never said to me, but I know it is in the background. It’s my job to get a performance out of the team every single day, it’s my job to keep them in tip-top shape week on week.

“They’re a very proud club, they’re a club that sets targets from the start of the year to the end. We wanted to win this game to finish out 2021 as winners. Now next month we move into 2022, that’s another year.

“And what a great way to start a year if you could start it by winning an All-Ireland semi-final.”

Ballyhale needed a last minute goal to bring St Rynagh’s to extra-time before they eventually prevailed in the semi-final, but their final success was as one-sided as they come. 

O’Connor’s goal-hungry team put six goals past their Laois opponents in a 27-point victory and they appear to be peaking at the right time. 

“Look, there was a bit of pressure coming in I suppose. As we all know, we probably hadn’t been playing up to scratch over the last two or three games and we were still getting the wins.

“Once you are winning, you are moving onto the next game. But we knew as a team we had to come up here and put in a big performance and thankfully they did. As someone said earlier, if you poke the bear enough eventually it will wake, and thankfully that was today.”

Asked if the fright they received in the semi-final lead to yesterday’s ruthless performance, O’Connor agreed.

“Definitely, 100%. That day we left it until the last 10 seconds to get a draw, we kicked on in extra time and went back to 15 men and finished the game well. But I’m looking at that at training every night.

Ballyhale Shamrocks manager James O’Connor. Ryan Byrne / INPHO Ryan Byrne / INPHO / INPHO

“You ask me that on any given weekend, and I would say they are in great form So I was surprised we were performing like that in the games, even though we were still doing enough to win.

“But we spoke Friday night and everyone laid it on the line – players and management and we said we just wanted to leave the game in Croke Park on Sunday; leave it there. And that’s exactly what happened.”

TJ Reid suffered a jarred knee early in the game but continued after receiving treatment, before his 46th minute withdrawal.

O’Connor revealed that his star player has been battling a groin injury in recent weeks.

“He has been struggling for the last couple of weeks, since the county final really. He has a bit of a groin injury and we’re trying to rest him as best we can. With the games coming three weeks on there, it was hard.

“In fairness to him, he’s a fantastic man to look after himself and to rehab himself to a very hiugh standard.

“I hope now with the couple of weeks of a break now he’ll be able to settle himself down and give himself a bit of time out because he’s going a long time.”

Clough-Ballacolla saw an excellent season come to an end in disappointing fashion.

“What can you say, Ballyhale are a serious, serious outfit,” stated manager Declan Laffan.

“You have to take your hat off to them, they’re an exceptional outfit. They punished us big time just before the break – we had no way of coming back from that. I don’t think we deserved though to lose the way we lost. We’re not that poor a team. Things just didn’t go at all for us after that.

Clough-Ballacolla’s Robbie Phelan looks on after the game. Ryan Byrne / INPHO Ryan Byrne / INPHO / INPHO

“We had set up playing with a third midfielder to limit the possession going inside, turn it into a battle zone. But we didn’t look like having a goal inside. Once they hit us with the goals, we had to open up and change our system.

“They’re ruthless. They tore us to shreds. You go through their forwards and one is scarier than the other. They’re exceptional.”

Reflecting on a campaign where they won a pair of county titles and achieved the club’s first victory in the province, Laffan added: “To win two county finals within the space of 12 weeks was fantastic.

“They are as committed and as honest a bunch of guys as you could meet anywhere. I really feel for them because I don’t think they deserved that.

“It’s a huge journey for a Laois team to go on. I think it was Castletown the last team up here in 01 – that’s 20 years. People like to go for the underdog. We’ve been the underdog most of the year.

“We like proving people wrong but we ran out of gas today,” he concluded.

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