If Waterford are to trump Cork on Sunday Michael ‘Brick’ Walsh will have had a huge say in it.
The Stradbally stalwart is the life and soul of this Déise outfit, with his selfless style and his unmatched ability to bring other players into the game.
‘Brick’ plays the game at his own pace, he never seems to be fully sprinting, but what he is doing is thinking and you’ll rarely see the man make a mistake.
One of his most valuable attributes is his ability to come out of a ruck with a ball, and to give a perfect pass to an onrushing teammate, he lays it on a plate for them.
Derek McGrath’s big half forward came under discussion on The GAA Hour Hurling Show on Thursday, and both Damien Hayes and Conal Keaney spoke of their past experiences with the provider supreme.
Former Dublin star Keaney feels that Brick is an example to all older players in the game, in the way he’d changed his game, both in a positional sense (He used to play centre back) and in the way he knows that he doesn’t have the same ability to pick off scores – he just lets other people do it.
“He was marking me in a couple of games, and no matter what he did, he was giving me slaps no matter where I went. I would’ve always loved to catch the ball, but even before the ball hit mid-air, Brick would be hitting me.
“When the ball goes to the ground, he gets his arse around it and gets it. He gives the ball off one handed to lads then, and he certainly lets you know when he does that.
“He has definetely changed his game in the last five or six years. It’s a great credit to him that he is able to change his game. He’s the master of getting the ball into his hand and giving it off to someone with this one handed pass.”
“It is a hard thing to do because he seems to attract three or four opponents to him all the time and he gives it to a lad in space. He doesn’t get the fancy scores but those kinds of players are invaluable in a squad. You can go to war with them, you know they’re going to battle hard,” added Keaney.
Damien Hayes gave the most valuable insight of all on Walsh, and that was that he wears two pairs of shorts on matchday.
The Portumna man always wondered when he came up against the Waterford warrior what the reason was, and he has even compiled a few theories as to why.
“Whatever it is, he wears two pairs of shorts during matches. If you watch him the next day, unless he’s listening to this podcast now and he changes, and maybe the first pair he has on is a pair he wore when he made his first start for Waterford in 2004,” revealed Hayes.
So, in the dressing room before a game, Walsh puts on one pair of shorts, and throws on another for good measure.
We’ve never heard the likes before, but it seems to work for him.
You can listen to the lads wax lyrical about Walsh from 33″00′ and much more from The GAA Hour Hurling Show here.
