Hurling: Ian O'Riordan talks to Eugene Cloonan, who reveals how he felt about missing out on the county's All-Ireland final last September

He repeatedly refers to it as 12/09 - the day after the All-Ireland hurling final. The day Eugene Cloonan could finally step out of the darkness and start to live again. 12/09 - the first day of the rest of his life.

Only he knows the exact depths to which he fell during the summer, when he watched from the outside as the Galway hurlers won their way past Tipperary and Kilkenny and into the All-Ireland final. Only he knows the pain he felt with every waking hour, how dangerously unhealthy his dependency on hurling had become.

Only he knows what it's like to be Eugene Cloonan. Everyone else just wonders, or else tries to label him. Ever since he made his Galway debut eight years ago, aged 18, those labels have come thick and fast: budding greatness; irrepressible and fearless; sublimely brilliant; a legend already; coolly determined, and, potentially, explosive.

"A freak of nature," he suggests.

The one label he'd put on himself is "unfailingly shy".

Yet he's agreed to talk about the first days of the rest of his life because for once he feels he has something to say. And it's not, as some people might suspect, about how much Galway hurling needs him - but rather how much he needs Galway hurling.

Cloonan - the hitman, the star, the unwavering talent - played zero part in Galway's championship run. An old back injury flared up at the end of the National League, and he went outside the panel for treatment. Recovery happened soon enough. The call to come back didn't (was he needed?). The call was never made (was he wanted?). Another week became another month and then the whole summer.

"Hurling is the most important thing in my life," he says, with partial reluctance. "It's what I've been at since I was a youngster, for 12 months of the year. It's like that in the family too, so I'd no choice really. And the goal has always been the same, to win an All-Ireland with Galway. So being out of it for a year now has really made me want to get back there."

Over several hours of conversation Cloonan keeps returning to that point: winning an All-Ireland. It defines every great player of the generation, but few appear more wrapped up in it than Cloonan. That's ultimately why he found his life so shattered in the weeks before 12/09.

The circumstances that led to his exile from the Galway panel are history now, he says, dead and buried. He displays a genuine discomfort at the mere prospect of portraying any bitterness or placing any blame for what happened. There was clearly a stand-off between the player and the management, but he's not about to stir it up again by isolating his side of the story.

What he can talk about is that lonesome, torturous time away from the Galway panel, and how it just kept on eating away at him. It's not something he's rushed into, and he's never heard of a PR exercise, but Galway hurling is such a part of him now that he just can't let go. Not at 26 years of age, when physically he's only coming into his prime.

"Last year is over now, I mean that, and there's no point in looking back. I never spoke one word about it to any newspaper at any stage of the summer. The brother, Diarmuid, was the same. I know there were some sources coming from Athenry, but I'd nothing to do with them. I was happy to say nothing. It was all just rumour.

"And once the matches started, and I wasn't there, I accepted my season was probably over. That was hard. When it came to the Sunday of a match it would really kick in. That I should be there, out there with the team. That's when it hit me. I'd been there since 1997, and that's a long time now.

"Then, when they started winning, and you weren't part of it, you'd start to think even more. To see everyone else on a roll, and you're outside of it. I know that sounds a little selfish, but the further it went on the worse it got. It was becoming a reality that you might miss out on an All-Ireland. That would have been great for Galway, to win, but not for yourself. It would take a hard person to say they weren't sorry they were missing out on it."

CLOONAN'S HELD THE respect of his team-mates for holding his counsel. But it was a killer of a year, he admits, head-wrecking stuff, and everything can be traced back to the lower-back injury that had been flaring up at regular intervals since 2003. He doesn't remember exactly where or when it started, but his championship that year consisted of a brief appearance against Tipperary.

He played throughout 2004 enduring the pain, and still crushing teams softly with his assassin-like shooting. He finished Galway's winning league campaign as their top scorer. He hit 0-7 on the day Kilkenny destroyed them in championship.

Later, just after he set off as captain on another successful run with his club Athenry, his lower back gave out completely. By then he'd already pursued several paths of treatment. Dr Brendan Day, formerly with Galway, did everything he could. He had scan after scan. They considered a steroid injection, then decided he should take them orally.

No good. They tried an epidural injection into the spinal cord to reduce the inflammation. No good. They were considering surgery when Colm Flynn, the Clare physio who also worked with Athenry, set up a visit to Ger Hartmann's clinic in Limerick. That was December of last year, two weeks before Christmas. After a quick examination, Hartmann didn't like what he saw. Cloonan's sacroiliac joint was noticeably misaligned. The facet joints of his lower spine were all inflamed. As a result, his right hip joint was also being unnaturally strained. A lot of wear and tear, a lot of accumulated injuries, and now his whole lower back was a mess.

He had another session with Hartmann two days before Christmas, and several more in the new year. Towards the end of February, with Athenry's All-Ireland club semi-final looming, he was still in deep pain. He spent four days in bed from the Thursday to the Sunday, unable to move, then saw Hartmann the following Tuesday. After a lengthy physio session he felt like he could run home. He was finally in the clear.

"All the frustration I had at that time came from the injury. Like when I'm breaking down and only finishing half a session. I'd train for a month, and be crocked for two weeks. It's when you're behind like that the problems start.

"And I wouldn't be a natural athlete. I do have to train hard, all the time. If I miss even a week I'm slipping behind. And if it's something that keeps recurring then it really gets to you, and leaves you very frustrated. And that does affect everything about your life. If you wake up in the morning and can't even walk, it's a bad start, and you're in bad form for the day.

"For any sportsperson I think injury is the worst thing in the world. It's your worst nightmare really. Any athlete or player will tell you that, I know, and that it is part of the game. It's just hard to accept sometimes."

Yet Cloonan's nightmare was only beginning. Athenry were beaten by James Stephens in the All-Ireland club final, so he just threw himself back into the county training. He played three straight league matches, scoring the opening point in the win over Wexford on April 10th, and 0-7 in the win over Cork a fortnight later. Business as usual, or so he thought.

At training the next Tuesday night he felt a sharp pain in his hip, and pulled up again. He saw Hartmann the following day, and they agreed he needed to back off for at least two weeks. And that's when the problem went from an injury to an exile - and the story is fast-forwarded to 12/09.

"Look, I just want to get back hurling with Galway. That's all I'm concerned about at the moment. The main thing is the back is holding up 100 per cent, so I can do the training I want to do. There's nothing worse for me than not being able to do the training.

"Physically I was fine all during the summer. Actually, I never stopped training. I was training three days a week with the club, and two more on my own. And playing some football too. The thing is, I absolutely love it. When I'm training without any pain there's nothing else I'd rather do. If it ever felt like a chore I wouldn't do it.

"But once I was injured I just got pissed off again, and I suppose that's the time when someone needs a bit of support, and a bit of help. I think I was more frustrated than I'd ever been, having tried hard to prepare for something only to break down again. So yeah, you'd want a bit of support and help in a situation like that.

"And of course you'd always hope you'd get the call. But the main thing I focused on was getting the body right. I'm still only 26, and not turning 27 until Christmas. So I felt I had time on my side. It might have been different if I was 30."

BIT BY BIT, however, his exile became a more torturous sentence. In the weeks and days before Galway's defeat to Cork, he found it increasingly intolerable - and all the talk of All-Irelands inescapable. He had trouble sleeping, and, worse still, training.

"When a county gets to an All-Ireland for the first time in a few years you can't escape it. It's everywhere you look. The flags are out, and the jerseys, and things like that. Luckily the people on the street weren't saying much in front of me, because they knew it was an awkward situation.

"I kept to myself a lot. But that's just the way I am. I like to go about my own thing anyway. Getting back was really the only thing keeping me going. Once I accepted that I wasn't going to be back, I just focused on getting ready for next year. But then that's hard when it's so far away. I was lucky I had so many good people around me. My father and my uncle Jarlath, and club people like PJ Molloy and Gerry McNamara. Everyone at the club really. You couldn't be around a better bunch of lads."

Hartmann would also call regularly, just to chat. Yet Cloonan's frustrations were starting to show. "They were, yeah, with things like the drinking. You wouldn't have the discipline you should have, you know? But then that doesn't help things either.

"Maybe the hurling had become too important to me. But I think most county players would feel that way. There's so much time involved now that you couldn't be at it otherwise. To win an All-Ireland I think you have to be that way."

Partly a victim of his success, Cloonan is unconsciously admitting an over-reliance on his hurling. It's not just an obsession. It's the only career he's ever known. He's working with IFA in Galway, but has yet to truly build a life outside of the game he was born and raised on. He was told he'd be better off leaving the country on All-Ireland Sunday, but he realised he'd nowhere else to go. As expected, it proved the longest day of his life.

"I'd lost an All-Ireland in 2001, and was devastated, so for the players of course I was hoping Galway would win. And for the county and all the supporters. But it's different when you think about yourself. I thought I should have been out there. When I started out, say 10 years ago, I was always thinking if Galway did win an All-Ireland in my time I would be there. These are the kind of things going through my head. It's like my good friend Joe Rabbitte, who played 13 or 14 years with Galway, and won everything at club level, but still missed the All-Ireland. He came close in 2001 when coming to the end of his career, and that's a regret he has. He knows the position I'm in.

"I know I'm lucky to have had all the success with the club, and three All-Irelands (with the club). We've had an unreal run really, but the big one is always in the back of your mind. I feel the only thing left for me now is to win an All-Ireland with Galway."

He has made contact with one member of the Galway management, but these days most of his thoughts are with his club. Tomorrow Athenry play Loughrea in the county semi-final (and there's some history there, too). Right now he doesn't even think about the prospect of not playing for Galway again. Some day he knows he will.

"I just want to get the most out of the years I've left. I do appreciate it more now having been away for a season. When you're inside you don't fully realise what it means to be there, but you do when you're on the outside. I do feel more mature now as well, especially after missing the year.

"Maybe I do want to go out and prove I'm still good enough, and still have something to offer . . . Once I can train properly I think I can still improve. I still have the absolute love of hurling. But my motivation hasn't changed. The only motivation I've ever had is to win an All-Ireland. I don't need anything else. I don't want to finish my career without an All-Ireland medal."

So that's what defines Eugene Cloonan, before and after 12/09. In the past it's proved an unforgiving burden, and he carries it into the future.