A must-read from the storied pages of The Clare Champion.
Davy Fitzgerald and Peter O’Connell – two men well known and respected in the Banner County – sat down at The Temple Gate Hotel on Wednesday for an in-depth chat.
Given that the pair had clashed after Clare’s draw with Wexford, last July, in the tunnel beneath Cusack Park, and Fitzgerald’s banning of the same scribe from press briefings, this shaped up to be the Frost/Nixon of its time.
The interview did not disappoint.
After agreeing to disagree on certain aspects of the past, Fitzgerald insisted he was forward focused. He claimed he does not read everything written about his side, but adds that most of it eventually comes back to him.
If the 2013 All-Ireland champions lose their qualifier match, on July 4, their championship will be over. Fitzgerald is confident he can right the ship but feels, even if his side lose, the county board will back him.
The Clare players, he revealed, prefer to have him on the sidelines but, as a consequence, he often grates upon match officials.
Fitzgerald described what he believes to be an RTE agenda against him. He commented, ‘I think it is pretty unfair that the camera is on me all the time. RTE will probably show three or four minutes of me over 75 minutes but isn’t it funny that they get me when I’m asking a question?’
Intriguingly, as part of his desire to impart more freedom of thinking within the panel, Fitzgerald does not deliver all the team talks. Before the Banner’s Munster quarter-final loss to Limerick, Brendan Bugler and Conor McGrath delivered a rousing speech to their teammates.
Where was Fitzgerald? ‘I was on the field 10 or 15 minutes before the players came out,’ he said.
Fitzgerald gave an infamously feisty and, at times, awkward interview with RTE reporter Clare McNamara after the Limerick loss. He admitted he was annoyed, about the game, going into his TV interview.
‘I haven’t looked at that interview… I’m a passionate Clare man and I’m not going to change that. While there are certain things I would like to change in interviews, I’m not going to change that.
‘As much as certain people think I like to be in the public eye, I absolutely detest it.’
Perhaps the biggest insight into Fitzgerald’s drive in life, and passion for hurling, can be seen in the influence his father – Clare County Secretary, Pat Fitzgerald – has on him. He admitted there are many father and son spats over the team and, in particular, the costs they run up.
Fitzgerald recounted this classic conversation: ‘If I want sliothars, I put it to him and he says “What did ye do with the last bunch ye got”.’
Thoroughly brilliant stuff from O’Connell. Pick up, or click into, the latest from The Clare Champion for the full interview if you can.
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