Eoin Kelly profile: Keith Dugganprofiles the prodigiously talented Tipperary star who has illuminated the game of hurling for much of the last decade
It seems hard to believe that Eoin Kelly is entering the mature phase of his hurling life. Even before the rampaging and apparently unstoppable scoring spree he delivered against Limerick early last summer, the highest accolades possible were frequently heaped upon the Mullinahone man.
Although he was the archetypal child prodigy, hailed as the real thing on the grapevine of knowledge that unites the hurling vales of Munster and south Leinster, there was never any visible apprenticeship about Kelly's ascendancy from the kid brimming with talent to the fully realised sporting colossus that he has become. He had the temperament to enhance the gifts and a breezy, self-deprecating way of coping with the praise and profile that came with his unique facility with a hurley.
Hurling creates a thirsty need for comparison, generating much discussion and debate as to which was the true golden period, what team was the best and which individual holds the divine claim to having been the best. It is a fascinating and dangerous business for the judgements of even the most astute and acerbic of greybeards who can recall with vivid clarity the immortal moments of Christy Ring or Mick Mackey or Jimmy Doyle are likely to be compromised by the fact that those shining plays represent a connection to the blue remembered hills of their youth.
Although Kelly has been frequently mentioned in that lofty company, his own historic database stretches only as far as the 1980s and to the first coming of Mullinahone's original genius, John Leahy. In his All-Ireland winning season of 2001, Kelly told this newspaper that, while he did not remember the games, he often watched videos of Leahy as he was in 1988, fresh-faced, verging on stocky and wonderfully light on his feet. "The only concern was how Johnny played," he said then.
It was an odd quirk of luck and genetics that Mullinahone, hard against the Kilkenny border and one of the rare football strongholds in Tipperary, produced two such extraordinary hurlers in successive generations.
"I think that is one way in which Eoin was awful lucky," says Páidí Butler, the national coaching director who supervised training sessions when Kelly was under-14. "He was born in the perfect time and place in that he grew up when John Leahy was the supreme hurler in Ireland and he was at that impressionable age. Eoin's Mam and Dad were very dedicated to the game and the Mullinahone club had great energy so the conditions and the inspiration were there for him. The environment was perfect.
"And then he had this phenomenally inquisitive mind when it came to learning all that he could about the game. I think he knew he had an exceptional ability, but he was never content to settle for that and he was always looking for a way to improve. I think that is a trait that brilliant people share, they are intrigued by what whatever talent they possess and that is how Eoin was about his sport."
Butler first saw Kelly among 100 young teenagers at a hurling clinic he gave about 12 years ago. "Within 60 seconds, it was clear that here was someone who you would, in hurling terms, be privileged to come across once in a lifetime."
By the time Kelly went to board in St Kieran's, after his junior certificate, his reputation preceded him. Adrian Finan, who taught and coached Eoin at the Kilkenny school, had listened to the rapt predictions of Willie Maher and Donnacha Fahey who had witnessed Kelly's supernova dominance at close quarters. By the age of 15, he had become a scoring machine for Mullinahone.
Finan remembers his surprise at Kelly's physical strength during the first training session, powerful legs thumping like pistons, the low centre of gravity and then the full repertoire of skills, as the county boys had advertised.
"The quality of his striking, even at that age, off right or left, immediately stood out. His first touch was impeccable. And it used to be said that Eoin wasn't particularly fast, but he had this sidestep which I think he made all his own and you would never tire of watching and it always seemed to give him all the time he needed to strike. Some days you would watch him after training and he would be taking frees from 20 yards and putting topspin on the ball, things like that, which the younger lads would love trying to copy. He just seemed to come in here with the complete range."
Within the superstructure of the school, Kelly was the boy the younger ones wanted to emulate. He featured on a distinguished team featuring Tommy Walsh, Brian Hogan and Jackie Tyrrell and in a two-year period, they lost just one match, the 1999 AllIreland colleges final to a strong St Flannan's team led by Tony Griffin, Tony Carmody and Conor Plunkett. The Ennis school hit upon an inspired vein of form late on, firing 2-6 to win the match by five points.
Kelly played well, giving his fellow county man Dermot Gleeson a tough time before Ronan Looney took up the marking job. He finished with 1-6, but as Finan recalls, he was shattered by the defeat. A year later, St Kieran's atoned for the disappointment.
Seven years later, Finan remembers Kelly for his demeanour as much as his supreme performances on the field. He carried himself with an easy way and subtly managed to deflect the praise he got from the younger kids back on to them. He seemed to handle the attention to the point of enjoying it without ever giving the impression that it was something he dwelt on one way or the other. It was the same with Tommy Walsh, a fairly reserved individual blessed with flamboyant hurling skills.
"There are certain players that seem to know what is in store for them. Eoin was like that," says Finan. "You see plenty of young hurlers out there and the game is going well for them and they hit 18 and they milk it for all it is worth and, before they know it, it is over. That was never going to happen with Eoin."
For Nicky English, then the Tipperary boss, the only dilemma was when best to employ this latent talent. Kelly's youth never seemed to be a factor. As English puts it, even when Kelly was 17, "it felt as if he had been around for ever".
The debut now seems tinted by fate. Listed as a substitute goalkeeper in the 2000 All-Ireland quarter final against Galway, he came on as an outfield player and immediately struck an oblique point. A year later, Kelly claimed he found the pace of the match hard to adapt to, adding his gratitude to Eugene O'Neill who "threw me a handy ball and I got an easy point".
If he struggled though, nobody noticed.
"With Eoin we never really had any worries," says English.
"He was a strong lad, he had a lot of hurling experience and he was completely comfortable in that championship arena. Our main attentions were directed towards Lar Corbett, who we had brought in with no minor experience. With Eoin, it was just a question of letting him go. He seemed to stroll through the league his first season. See, he has known no other way from when he was a young lad."
English picks the 2001 Munster championship match against Clare as Kelly's official graduation. It was probably the last sting of the ferocious Clare/Tipp hurling rivalry that was the dark and riveting foundation of the "golden years" of the 1990s. And Tipperary were, at last, beginning to enjoy the better of it. During the molten early exchanges, Kelly and the great Clare centre half Seán McMahon met full-tilt. The veteran got there first and, as English remembers, "drove the ball and Eoin on up the field".
English ignored the general play for a few seconds and studied his forward casually brushing himself down, unbothered by the collision. Within a couple of moments, he encountered another bell-ringing shoulder from Ollie Baker and again, he picked himself up and serenely set about addressing a free near the sideline, which he dispatched over the bar.
"I just felt that if he could come through those two tackles, from two of the toughest players of that period, then nothing could intimidate him."
It was as though Kelly regarded physical attempts to ruffle his composure as much a part of the game as free-taking or passing or running with the ball.
Adrian Finan can instance plenty of school games where there were blatant attempts made to rough Kelly up, but only once did he acknowledge it. Finan was reluctant to name the school, but it was a game that St Kieran's were winning easily and a parade of different defenders took turns in coming over to clatter Kelly whenever he took possession. It was clear he was getting annoyed, but he wasn't interested in the option of withdrawing early. "And towards the end of the game, he was racing towards the sideline. He was after taking serious punishment and it was still going on and he drew his elbow back and he let the other lad know that enough was enough. He didn't even get a booking, but he made his point. That was the only time I ever saw him retaliate."
When English guided Tipperary unbeaten through the 2001 league and championship, Kelly had his AllIreland medal at just 19. Personal accolades like consecutive young hurler of the year awards and four All-Stars have followed and, although Tipp hurling has stuttered since then - with the Premier county failing to reappear in an All-Ireland final since that victory - Kelly has continued to illuminate the game.
Páidí Butler believes that a hurler has to rule at the top for "10 or 12 years before you can talk in terms of greatness" and allows that Kelly is well down that road now. But it is clear that his legacy cannot ever be measured in terms of All-Ireland senior medals. Virtually all of Kelly's newspaper interviews reveal him as pleasant and light-hearted and optimistic, with only flickering hints of inner anxiety over he last six years of championship disappointment.
"If you think about it, most players' careers are short enough," he noted at a player of the month ceremony last year. And on another occasion he sounded almost baffled when he observed that he had been hurling with Tipperary for 10 years.
When Kelly came into the team, the forwards revolved around the bulky wizardry of Declan Ryan and Leahy, although injury-plagued, was a force in the dressingroom. Now, Kelly is the leader and he is Tipperary's prime source for optimism.
When Ger O'Grady was asked about Tipperary's plans prior to last year's championship, he said jauntily, "it's obvious, isn't it. Just keep hitting the ball into Eoin Kelly". The remark was meant in jest, but maybe there is a truth in it too.
"Maybe we have been a bit too dependent on Eoin to get scores," says English. "Its not possible for any one hurler to sustain that attack game after game. But I do think there are other players coming through now that can take that pressure off Eoin - even his brother Paul coming up and playing corner forward during the league."
In the afterglow of last year's virtuoso show against Limerick, Kelly cheerfully admitted that all the references to the most illustrious names in the game and all talk of greatness "flew over my head".
His happy acceptance of his brilliance at the game has been among his greatest gifts. The eagerness and the fascination remain undimmed and, although he has hurled through several frustrating years, there has never been a hint of rancour or animosity or disillusionment. He has to believe that there more All-Ireland senior medals await him, but the realist in him must know that there is no guarantee of that. His solution is model and simple - to do all he can on the field for Tipperary, through thick or thin.
Like Nicky English says, it is as though Eoin Kelly has been around forever. In other words, it is impossible and even frightening to think of Tipperary hurling without Eoin Kelly. We may as well enjoy the privilege while it lasts.