Tony Kelly brings that hurley to bed with him.
His father Donal is convinced of it.
Then he gets up out of bed and the first thing he does every morning is go outside for a few pucks. At the crack of dawn, in a yard in Ballyea is where you’ll find him, zipping a sliotar off left and then off right off the house’s gable end and then controlling it, caressing it manipulating it and testing it. Then he drills it back off the wall again and then he brings the ball back to glorious life again.
It’s only after he’s pinged a few balls, hammered a couple of walls and broken a sweat that he’ll come back into Donal Kelly’s house for the breakfast.
That’s the most graceful hurler in Ireland’s routine and by the time he’s got the touch in and the eye in, the O’Neills small ball is bursting into song and the rest of the Kellys from Ballyea are awake.
That was Tony Kelly’s way of beginning the day when the Clare jersey was like a dress on him he was so small.
“He wouldn’t be happy if he didn’t get the pucks in. Morning, noon and night, he never leaves his hurley down” says his father Donal in that thick, distinctive Clare accent.
“Even when he was being minded, our babysitter told us that they had to take him out to a field out the back of their house for a few pucks – the only one they had was a field full of rushes but Tony didn’t mind. Getting the few pucks in was the only way of keeping him happy.
“Honest to God, the hurley never left his hand from when he was so young,” he said.
And that’s still the way now.
“We went on holidays there this year and when we came home, he had a window broken in the house,” laughs Donie.
Only a few minutes down the road, Jack Browne will be doing the same thing. That’s the Ballyea way.
The small village south west of Ennis doesn’t have a pub in it but it has a GAA club and it has a wall-ball, a GAA pitch and it has plenty of good GAA men and GAA women.
Women like Joan Browne. Jack’s mother used to keep her son, Tony, Joe Neylon and any other of the Bally boys fed when they’d spend their days up at the Ballyea hurling pitch.
Pucking balls, off left and off right back and over, over and back. The only thing they’d stop for was a bit of grub. Joan would feed them and then they’d go back out again.
“Tony, Jack Browne and Joe Neylon – they used to live in that Ballyea hurling field. They’d spend days there and Joan Browne, Jack’s mother was great – they lived beside the field and she’d feed them for the day, and then the lads would go out again. Pucking ball all day long.”
And Men like Donie Kelly. He managed his son Tony’s underage teams from under-10 all the way to under-21 alongside another good Clareman, Fergal O’Loughlin.
Before they got involved, Ballyea were always in the B and C competitions underage. Tony’s was a bit of a golden generation though. Some say hurlers are born, some say they’re made. The truth is probably somewhere in between the two of them but there’s no denying that little Ballyea’s famous run to the All-Ireland club hurling final in 2016 wouldn’t have happened without the dedication and devotion of these men way before 2016.
It was Kelly and Loughlin who made hurling the greatest game, and the only game, in Ballyea.
“Myself and Fergal Loughlin – we managed them from under-10s to under-21s. All the way up through the ages, we used to bring them to all of the Clare seniors’ league games. We’d organise a challenge match for them on the way against a team from Tipp or a team from Limerick and then bring them to the game. They loved it, one day we played two games, one before the Clare game and one on the way home…sure lads used to be saying – Donie Kelly and Fergal, these lads are mad! But the lads loved it, they were always asking when was the next one.
“I suppose that was the start of it!”
And then Ballyea took off. Tony captained them to an under-12 A Clare championship – the club’s first ever. They beat Sixmilebridge again in the under-14 final and they’d have battles with the Bridge all the way up to under-21.
This was a special bunch of Bally boys, but there was something about Tony.
“I remember an under-14 game, himself and Gearóid O’Connell were in the full forward line. They were only 10 or 11 and they scored 4-6 between them. The jersey was like a dress on Tony because it was so big but it didn’t bother him at all. He was just so fast and so skilful.”
Nowadays, Tony and Jack go to the gym and they go to the hurling wall together. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
That seems to be the theme in Ballyea. It’s two years on since that famous run in 2016 that put the little parish on the map. Now they’re county champions again, and now they’re in bonus territory again.
Donal Kelly has been alongside his son every step of this great journey. And he’ll be down in Waterford this Sunday when they take on Ballygunner in the Munster club semi-final.
“Sure look, they won the county, anything from here now is a bonus. We’re heading down to Waterford the night before, we’re looking forward to it.”
So is Tony.
“Sure he’s just out there doing what he absolutely loves. He loves hurling like, loves running, being in the middle of it. He never really shows nerves, he’d be down after matches if they lost or if it didn’t go well for him but he’d just be out and he’d take it out on the wall again.”
And Tony Kelly, he’s only 24 yet.
