Tomorrow's All-Ireland club hurling semi-finals may have been disrupted but for Galway champions Gort, the switch of venue is a mere detail compared to when they faced this weekend's opponents Ballyhale Shamrocks from Kilkenny in the 1984 All-Ireland final.
"That was the year they decided to play it over a weekend in Navan," says Matt Murphy, the former Galway minor and senior manager who played for Gort 31 years ago and is part of the current management team. "We played Midleton, the Cork champions, on Saturday and Ballyhale the next day. They'd beaten the Ulster champions."
The match ended in a draw – Murphy scored the goal that appeared to have given Gort the title but Dermot Fennelly, one of seven brothers playing for Ballyhale, equalised and another brother Kevin came close from 60 yards to converting a late free to win the match.
Further inconvenience was caused by the replay not being played for another seven weeks, ironically, given tomorrow’s switch of venue, in Thurles.
First final
Shamrocks won by six, 1-10 to 0-7, with all of the scores coming from the Fennellys.
"It was our first final," says Murphy, "but they'd won the All-Ireland a couple of years before. We had Sylvie Linnane and Pearse Piggott and had won the county in 1981 but we had to go to Kilkenny then to play James Stephens."
The current Ballyhale team also features a share of Fennellys and has won a couple of All-Ireland titles. Murphy says Gort prefer to be aiming high in championship matches.
“I actually think that Gort, if they’re playing an ordinary team, don’t really rise to the occasion; you rarely see them beating a team out of sight but if we’re up against a very good side we’ll rise to the challenge. Portumna and Clarinbridge, who Gort beat in the recent county finals, were both All-Ireland champions at the time.”
He believes that the experience of playing an All-Ireland semi-final three years ago against Coolderry from Offaly will stand to Gort.
“I think a good bit was learned from that experience. The preparation is much more focused than it was in 2011. Back then there had been quite a gap since the last county title. Most of the younger fellas on the team wouldn’t even have been born when the club last won. There’s a feeling they didn’t do themselves justice.
“Then a year later when St Thomas’s went on to win the All-Ireland that rubbed salt into the wounds.”
Galway clubs have a great record in the championship, though. On 13 occasions the Tommy Moore Cup has gone west, which is a record for a county, as is the distribution, which has seen seven Galway clubs lift the prize.
Murphy says this acts as both an encouragement and a motivation.
The historical coincidence that pits the two clubs against each other 31 years after their All-Ireland final meeting isn’t matched in the other semi-final but Ulster champions Portaferry are making history by contesting their first All-Ireland semi-final.
Underdogs
So far Down clubs haven’t managed to get to the final on St Patrick’s Day but last year was a major encouragement for underdogs when Carlow’s Mount Leinster Rangers progressed all the way to the final where they lost to Portumna.
They can also take heart from the fact that three years ago the Ulster champions Loughgiel defeated their Munster counterparts, Na Piarsaigh, before going on to win the All-Ireland.
Portaferry’s opponents tomorrow Kilmallock, are also from Limerick, a county that curiously for such a presence in the game has yet to win the club championship.
Kilmallock were one of three clubs from the county to reach three finals in four years – Ballybrown and Patrickswell were the others – between 1990 and 1993.
