Mark Kehoe was the man-of-the-match, Conor Browne was the winning captain but Shane Conway was the man in demand.
‘He has his own little escort,’ said one of the many Lixnaw folk in the crowd shortly after Conor Browne had lifted the Electric Ireland Fitzgibbon Cup.
‘Jesus, everybody wants to talk to Shane…it’s the Shane Conway fan-club,’ said another.
And that’s exactly what it was.
The Lixnaw gem belted out ‘Olé, Olé, Olé’ with his teammates, he cheered on captain Conor Browne’s brilliant winning speech but through it all, the people he really wanted to chat to were the group of glowing Kerry faces taking over the side of the WIT field.
And when he eventually made it back to them, young and old they queued up for photos, they patted him on the back, they told him how proud they were of him and he, he really couldn’t have looked much happier.
This was the 30 strong Lixnaw fan club who made the three hour journey across the country to Waterford to support their man in the Electric Ireland Fitzgibbon Cup final for UCC against Mary I on Saturday afternoon.
Shane Conway celebrates with the @LixnawGAA jersey. A bus of around 30 made the three hour trip to Waterford to see him today 👏 @UCCgaaClub pic.twitter.com/QRCS2NIwHu
— GAA JOE (@GAA__JOE) February 23, 2019
What a lovely photo with members of the fan-club with the Lixnaw number 14 jersey.
He didn’t disappoint, scoring six points in another fine display and speaking to us after the game he was on form again.
“Ah it’s a great buzz yeah,” he said with a wide smile adorning his face.
“There aren’t too many Fitzgibbon Cup medals around any county, they’re very hard to come by. It’s a serious competition, so I’m just delighted to have won it today,” he added.
And then he paid tribute to his loyal band of supporters who have been with him all the way.
“They got a bus up from Lixnaw, around 30 of them… It takes about three hours so, in fairness to them, they were up early and they got here for the game. It’s nice that they all made it up, it makes it that bit more special that all them are coming to support you, they’ll have a long trip home but at least we won, it’ll be a bit sweeter for them anyway,” he said.
As for the game itself, Conway and UCC were delighted with how it went. From Tipperary, Cork, Kerry, Waterford and Kilkenny, they all clicked and what unfurled was an untouchable display of hurling.
“We knew we had a good team. We had a serious semi-final against DCU and that kind of got us ready for this. We had the heart and we had the determination and a few of the Cork boys were saying do you know, everybody was giving out about them that they might be bottlers for missing out on an All-Ireland but it just shows that they’re a great bit of stuff and thankfully we pulled through today.”
“Fintan O’Connor (the Kerry manager) was very nice to me – he just said, ‘focus on the Fitzgibbon!’ he knows it’s a serious competition and it’s not as if anyone takes it lightly – everyone, all the county boys – all the managers in the finish kind of left us at it because they know how serious it’s taken…”
As for Kerry hurling, he’s delighted to play a part in its rise.
“I don’t really mind if they don’t rate us at all because we won our county championship this year down in Kerry and we played Charleville in the Munster semi-final – they got to the All-Ireland final in the finish and it just shows that we’re coming a small bit. I don’t really mind if anyone disrespects us because we know in our own house that we’re okay.”
They’ve a gem in their house in Shane Conway.
