THE first day Gearóid Ryan faced Kilkenny in Croke Park, everyone was young and living in their own dreams. It was 2006. Ryan was at centrefield, dictating Tipperary’s pulse in an All-Ireland minor semi-final.
Kilkenny had Richie Power, Colin Fennelly and Richie Hogan. Tipperary had Brendan Maher and Michael Cahill, Pa Bourke, Seamus Hennessy and Noel McGrath, blueblood teams of the purest pedigree expected to deliver the craftsmen, architects and warriors to build an empire.
Seamus Callanan was sprung from the bench with Kilkenny leading down the stretch. Two points pulled them level. Callanan got the winning score and Tipperary won an All-Ireland minor title against Galway the following month with manager Liam Sheedy apologising for shaving dozens of points off their Leaving Cert results and imploring the employers of Tipperary to bolt down their best prospects at home with jobs.
A couple of years passed. Sheedy brought Ryan into the senior panel in 2009. The living got better. The next year Kilkenny came charging at five-in-a-row that September. Ryan was at wing-forward shovelling coal, starting his first senior final as Tipp steamed away with an immortal win. He briefly cleaned the soot from his eyes to drill a precise pass to Noel McGrath that set up a goal for Lar Corbett. He was 22 years old, playing out of position like a prospect made good. Two successive All Star nominations followed his All-Ireland medal. In a team of immaculate hurlers Ryan was among Tipp’s best ball strikers with the smarts to get the best from every ball and every tackle.
“He is an important player for Tipp because he knows the mechanics of the game,” says Tipperary manager Eamonn O’Shea. “You get players who are more skilful or stronger who don’t know the mechanics of the game. It is the mechanics of the game that matter.”
Advertisement
That intelligence promised a long career, but his body suddenly started to give way. During the league semi-final against Cork in 2012, he felt the first dart in his groin, but filed the ache with every other twinge accumulated through years of hurling. Then, he gradually started to slow down. His leg hopped with pain when he sneezed.
His form wavered and his position as a foreman in Tipperary’s engine room was coming under question. He was substituted against Limerick and Cork in the Munster championship. By the time Tipp careered off towards calamity against Kilkenny that August, he had vanished from sight.
Ryan rested and returned in spring 2013 but was gone again before the summer. Last winter his hips were diagnosed as the problem. Both needed cleaning out.
“I was shocked. I suppose I was left with no other choice. If that hadn’t been successful for me then this year probably would have been ruled out again and maybe that would have been it for me, I don’t know.
“It would have been two and a half years out of the game if this last operation hadn’t been successful so you always wonder. Thankfully I came back and I put in a lot of hard work, a lot of nights on my own training, a lot of nights people don’t see. But that’s what it takes to get back to this level.”
Advertisement
The operations were done before Christmas. The rehabbing kept him in the pits for repair work during Tipp’s league campaign. He spoke to Kieran McGeeney this year about injuries and recovery and going deep to find the energy and stubborn streak to return again. Eamonn O’Shea’s phone calls and encouragement fed his confidence. He started his first Munster championship game in two years against Limerick and hit 1-2. Defeat forced them to face the mirror again and make familiar promises about commitment and honesty. This time they had to stick. When Tipp fashioned a season-defining comeback in their qualifier against Galway, it drew a line under every injury and defeat that went before.
“There was one thing in that game: no one ever panicked on the field. I know by talking to the lads after, I don’t think there was ever a moment in that game where we thought, ‘we’re in trouble here’. We just stayed playing to the end. It was a great turnaround at the finish and it’s something that has turned our year around. Despite all that had gone before, when I look back at this year that was the game that turned the year for us. It really gelled us together and got us playing as a real tight unit.”
For nearly 10 years they have won and lost as boys and men, listened to stories that buried them and pulled each other out of the dirt. Ryan’s injuries are gone. The past is nowhere. All he sees is Kilkenny in September, and dreams reborn.