Carrot of an All-Ireland hurling medal as a Limerick bear marked a rabbit
Mike Casey interviewed by Na Piarsaigh clubmate and former Limerick teammate Shane Dowling
THE LIMERICK hurlers worked like dogs in their All-Ireland final victory over Galway but one of the big battles was between a bear and a rabbit.
Mike Casey, known as “The Bear”, was marking Galway’s young hotshot Jason Rabbitte. As Mike was walking around Croke Park with his teammates with Liam MacCarthy he stopped to chat with RTÉ’s Damian Lawlor and his Na Piarsaigh clubmate and former Limerick player Shane Dowling.
Mike was an instrumental part of a defence that had limited Galway to just five points from play in the 55th minute.
Shane said to Mike, over the roar of the jubilant Limerick crowd, that ”workrate is boring, but Limerick's work rate and turnover today was off the charts, wasn't it?”
“Yeah, we put a lot of emphasis on our front eight, making sure that they got the tackles in,” said Mike.
"We had looked back at other games and saw that lads had followed Galway out, and we weren't going to do that.
“They have a couple of big target men inside that they were going to hit. If they were left with all that space, they were going to do damage so we put a lot of emphasis on that middle eight lads to make sure they got their tackles in,” he said.
The middle of the field was like a warzone. On numerous occasions Galway players crashed into a wall of Limerick hurlers who won the sliothar back. An incredible 1-17 of Limerick’s 1-29 was garnered from turnovers.
Shane asked Mike if he thought that Galway were going to leave as much space for the full forward line?
Shane said: “I know you were in the full-back line, but looking up the field, everybody thought that there was going to be maybe a player or two standing in front of the Limerick full forward line but they left loads of space, and arguably you should have been further ahead at half time.”
“Potentially,” said Mike.
“To be honest with you, I had my hands full at the other end. I didn't see a whole pile of what was going on there,” laughed the star defender.
Shane said he was slagging before the game that there was a bear taking on a rabbit.
Damian said the Limerick players dropped back to great great support for the full-back line
“Absolutely. It's a team game. You knew they were going to try and isolate lads inside. They were going to try and play their own style of game.
"It worked for them the first couple of minutes but then we altered a few things, changed around a few personnel, and kind of got to grips with it,” said Mike.
The Na Piarsaigh man, who won his sixth All-Ireland medal on Sunday, was asked about the effect of the wind which Limerick played into the first half just like against Kilkenny in the 2023 final.
“There is a big breeze here. It is directly going down that way but the way they played, and the way we were trying to play, there was a lot of running going on, and kind of trying to bring the ball to the middle and then deliver it in from there,
“A lot of their balls that they got in the first half were balls around the middle. They weren't just langering balls in,” said Mike, who was told by Damian to go celebrate and he didn’t need to be told twice!
Another pundit joining Shane on RTÉ’s coverage was former Tipperary hurling manager Liam Sheedy who was effusive in his praise of Limerick’s “magnificent” half-back line of Kyle Hayes, who scored two points from play, Diarmaid Byrnes, who chipped in with four points, and William O’Donoghue who was the glue in middle.
Former Tipperary goalkeeper Brendan Cummins, who was on co-commentary with Marty Morrissey, said “no egos” is the secret of Limerick’s success.
And long may that success continue!