Clare would not have won All-Ireland without Shane O'Donnell and Tony Kelly – Brian Lohan needs them to win it again

The Irish Sun

10-05-2025

CLARE would not have won the All-Ireland title last year without the magical pairing of Shane O'Donnell and Tony Kelly.
Stalwarts David McInerney and John Conlon did their bit too, despite their ages.
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Shane O'Donnell and Tony Kelly could both feature for Clare against Tipperary
Credit: Sam Barnes/Sportsfile
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Babs Keating believes Clare can't win All-Ireland without them
Credit: Piaras Ó Mídheach/Sportsfile
McInerney is 32, Conlon is 35 and Brian Lohan's fab four are the sole survivors from Davy Fitzgerald's 2013 All-Ireland replay-winning team — although Peter Duggan was a panellist that season.
The big news is O'Donnell's return to Lohan's bench for the visit of Tipperary's to Ennis this evening, but how fit is last season's Hurler of the Year?
A shoulder injury has kept him out all year and he said himself last month that he had only resumed light running.
Kelly missed their loss to Waterford at Walsh Park through illness, but is restored to the starting line-up today.
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Lohan needs them both to rescue Clare's summer and hang on to Liam MacCarthy.
Without their star duo, the performance in Walsh Park was flat and Peter Queally's men taught them a lesson with a 2-23 to 0-21 win.
The players they needed to step up in the absence of Kelly and O'Donnell failed to do so.
David Fitzgerald, Duggan, David Reidy, Mark Rodgers, Aidan McCarthy, Adam Hogan and Conor Leen didn't come anywhere near the levels that propelled the Banner to All-Ireland glory last July.
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If anything, they regressed and Clare's situation is perilous, with just one point from two games.
Tipp are in the same position ahead of tonight's game in Ennis, but the outlook is brighter for Liam Cahill than Lohan despite that 4-27 to 0-24 loss in Cork a fortnight ago.
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My early lessons as a Tipperary player are applicable to what I saw from the current crop against the Rebels.
I was 19, going on 20 in the league final 61 years ago.
I went to the half-back line and I picked up a ball behind Tony Wall and let fly without looking or thinking what I was doing.
I was talking to Tony at training and he said to me, 'You're a good hurler — but nobody in a blue and gold jersey has the right to hit a ball unless he's got a reason for it'.
Apply that to what I saw in Cork last Sunday week and there were so many instances I could pick out.
In fairness to Barry Hogan his puck-outs were spot on and had a lovely trajectory.
That's so important now but Clare don't get that level of quality from Eibhear Quilligan.
Tipperary need Ronan Maher to stand up and be counted more as captain if Cahill's men are to get out of Munster.
When I was manager, we brought in a sports psychologist but it was only a box-ticking exercise as far as I was concerned.
She put up a slide that said 99 per cent concentration can result in 100 per cent failure.
That was the thing that resonated with me more than anything.
She followed it up with a slide showing a stage of the Tour de France, where a rider had cycled for 2½ hours in the Alps.
He came into a short straight and threw his arms up into the air, but was pipped on the line by about an inch and a half.
That's what she meant by 99 per cent concentration can become 100 per cent failure.
That was obvious in Cork's three early goals.
TOO SLOW
The Tipp defence were just that second too slow to address the ball coming in.
Cahill has been around long enough to see what I saw and it was a bad beating in the first half.
But if you remove those mistakes and factor in that Tipp were down to 14 men following the dismissal of Darragh McCarthy, there was very little between the teams.
Experience counts for so much in the modern game.
We see it with Patrick Horgan and Séamus Harnedy in Cork, Stephen Bennett and Jamie Barron in Waterford, John and Noel McGrath in Tipp and the plethora of names that John Kiely can call upon with Limerick. If Tipp produce what they did against the Treaty when they battled to a draw, they will pip the Banner by about an inch and a half.
Leinster hurling is nearly forgotten about with so much focus on Munster, but Kilkenny will win that race and take their sixth consecutive provincial title.
Whatever about the state of hurling in Leinster, winning the Bob O'Keeffe Cup still comes with the massive prize of an All-Ireland semi-final berth.
It's great to see Offaly back in senior hurling, but a result at Nowlan Park this evening is beyond the Faithful County. Galway have been disappointing since Micheál Donoghue's return but they are a team in transition.
At the same time, even without the suspended Daithí Burke, they should have too much in Salthill for a Wexford team totally reliant on Lee Chin to do the business.
The only game I'm reluctant to call is Antrim's clash with Dublin at Corrigan Park.
If the Dubs were at home, I'd be opting for them but the Saffrons badly need a result to boost their survival hopes.
Eoin Cody's 1-13 ensured the Cats left Corrigan Park unscathed last time out, but Davy Fitzgerald will take huge positives from that performance and hope to better their 2-12 scoreline.
Dublin have won two from two, but they could definitely slip up in Belfast.
I fancy Galway to finish second after a disastrous campaign last year, when they failed to get out of Leinster.
Either way, Bob O'Keeffe will stay on Noreside as Kilkenny will win the final.
And there will be one hell of a scrap for third place.