HE’LL BE IN Musgrave Park on Friday night, doing his punditry thing for TG4 as Munster take on Glasgow Warriors. But come Sunday, he’ll be staying miles away from the madness unfurling as Clonlara take on Ballygunner in the Munster club hurling final.
Marcus Horan might be the veteran of 67 Ireland test matches and 225 Munster appearances, but when it comes to piseoga, he’s as GAA as it comes.
“I’d love to get down,” he admits.
“But there’s part of me too that wouldn’t go because I have been watching them all along on the TV and I would hate to be the Jonah who turns up and brings the bit of bad luck! I’ll watch it on TG4 when I get the chance.”
“My biggest memory of the year we won the Grand Slam (2009), I ended up having a photo taken with the Grand Slam and Triple Crown trophies, and the Canon Hamilton Cup (for the Clare senior hurling championship), when Clonlara had won in 2008. I’d say they left a few behind them since.
“I would have gone to a fair amount of games in the interim period when they would have lost. And then I swore I might stay away and see what happens. So I am expecting them to do a job on Sunday. But they are really up against it.”
Horan might have made himself a Munster legend, but it was in Clonlara, with a football and a hurl, that they put the bit of steel into the youngster.
Like many who went on to have glittering careers in the green of Ireland rugby, he secretly harboured some hopes that someday he might be able to squeeze a season of Gaelic Games in once the rugby came to an end.
In 2012, he teased the prospect out a small bit in an interview.
“It’s something in the back of your mind, to come back playing, but the way standard is rising I wouldn’t be anywhere near that. Even to play junior, I’d say I’d struggle. If I ever did go back it would be only at a social level,” he conceded.
If you’re wondering, he never did grip the hurl again. He lives in Castleconnell and his daughter plays camogie with Ahane.
Just venturing into the parish though, he knew he might rekindle some links and so it transpired.
When former goalkeeper Ger O’Connell was the manager, he was brought it to help out with a training session or two and give a talk to the players about his sporting experiences. He was delighted to accept.
“I would be very proud of the club and what it did for me. I started my sports journey through Clonlara GAA and played football and hurling there,” he says.
“So I ended up playing rugby in Limerick, but that Clonlara experience, my love of sport started there and I always say to the lads, the club got better at hurling once I took up rugby. There might be a connection then!
“The scary thing for me when I look at the team is that there are guys there that I would have played with their dads.
“For a small club, for a club that suffers a lot with losing players to Limerick City, to other sports; soccer and rugby, they do incredibly well to get to where they are.
“We all know what they are up against. Ballygunner have shown it. But anything can happen on the day and for the club… The camogie girls got to a Munster quarter-final as well. For that to happen for such a small club is fantastic.”
Back to that piece in 2012 with Diarmuid O’Flynn of the Irish Examiner, and it stood out that he singled out John Conlon’s performance in the Clare win over Dublin that summer, saying, “I was very impressed with John Conlon, he battled hard and the work he got through I think inspired the rest of the lads.”
11 years on, John Conlon is still doing John Conlon things, for club and county. No surprise to Horan.
“I heard John being interviewed after some of the Clonlara games and I think he said he was inspired by some of the younger players who have come into the team. It’s given him a bit of a kick,” he states.
“He said himself, he has seen some really good talent, but also guys who are not phased by the big occasions.
“And I think just seeing his demeanour at the games and during the games, he is looking like he is really enjoying hurling now.
“I think before, there was a lot expected of them when they were with Clare and then coming back to play club.
“These guys are amateur, they are trying to hold down jobs and develop their career outside of that. But it just seems that he is in a real good place right now.”
He adds, “There seems to be less pressure on him, even though he is the main man on the Clonlara team, because these young lads are taking up the mantle as well with the likes of Diarmuid Stritch who scored the winning point against Kiladangan.
“I think John relishes that stuff when he sees young lads performing as well so he gets the buzz off that too.
“Like any of us, you take great pride in seeing young talent coming through and continuing the traditions in the club and I think that’s what’s helping Clonlara.”
Come Sunday, he will be there, roaring and shouting along for Clonlara with all the passion he can muster.
But from the sofa, of course.
