Offaly hurlers make long trip to the south east for Leinster opener

KEVIN EGAN looks ahead to this Saturday evening"s Leinster championship clash between Wexford and Offaly which, despite being televised "live" on RTE 2, has yet to really attract national interest among the hurling fraternity. GAA teams invariably contain one or two players whose domain of employment is a little outside the ordinary. However, the work Stephen Nolan of Wexford must rank as perhaps the most remarkable that could be found in any dressing room in Ireland. The 23-year-old hurler is CEO of Kama Lifestyles, a 'dating training company' that aims to teach their customers to attract and keep their ideal women. Whether due to his work, his hurling or a higher power with a sense of humour, Stephen misses this weekend"s game on account of a groin injury. Once upon a time, a meeting of Offaly and Wexford would have been looked upon in the national media as a big occasion, a match well worth paying considerable attention to. It is a clear indicator of how far the two counties have fallen that the above anecdote is likely to be the most memorable thing about this match for anyone not resident in Birr, Banagher, Bunclody or the Ballagh. In Leinster hurling this year, the big stories are whether or not Kilkenny can be stopped, if the Dublin hurling renaissance is for real and how Galway and Antrim perform on their first sojourns into the province. While tomorrow night"s fixture has the makings of a hard fought and competitive tie, the nation does not expect either county to play a big part in this year"s hurling championship and, as such, the tie will attract a few sideways glances, but little more. To anyone who either attended the Division two final in Thurles or else watched the game on TV, it"s not difficult to see how people arrived at this conclusion. The match was of a very poor quality, with neither attacking line making any real inroads into the opposition defence and the game was decided by a Daniel Currams goal which most people suspect would not have come about if Damien Fitzhenry was guarding the Wexford net. The second fixture between Kilkenny and Tipperary only served to highlight the paucity of quality all the more. Joe Dooley is unlikely to worry unduly about the standard of that fixture since promotion was the sole target and that crucial goal has been attained. However, the Leinster Championship now rolls around and it appears that the piper has to be paid for that league run, at least to a certain extent. Last year, Offaly hurlers enjoyed their best championship season in some time, securing wins over Limerick and Laois and competing well with Kilkenny for 35 minutes and with Waterford for the duration of the game. A prominent factor in that run was the consistency of team selection, with as many as a dozen players featuring in basically every match from April onwards. Dooley continued his policy of always picking his strongest team during this year"s league and that policy was vindicated by the end result. However, he now finds himself with very few in-form forwards to choose from, as several of his starters are not hurling well while the reserve options haven"t been given sufficient game time to really assess their worth. The decision of Diarmuid Horan to travel to the States for the summer has robbed the Offaly management of one potential option for a half-forward slot later in the championship, and with that wild card taken away, the cupboard suddenly has a very bare look. However, Horan is part of the panel for the Wexford game and could see action as a substitute. The latest round of the hurling championship will not have sent Dooley into raptures about this issue at all. Joe Bergin, Brian Carroll, Cathal Parlon, Shane Dooley and Daniel Currams all had either quiet or downright poor days at the office. Colm Coughlan did hurl extremely well for Kinnitty in their win over St. Rynagh"s, but whatever amount of time he gets in Wexford Park will be his first senior competitive inter-county action and some bedding in time is likely to be necessary. Wexford are not short of problems of their own and the recent injury suffered by the aforementioned Nolan has merely added to Colm Bonnar"s already extensive casualty list. With players such as Darren Stamp, PJ Nolan, Keith Rossiter and Eoin Quigley also out of consideration due to injury, Wexford supporters too will come into this game somewhat short on confidence. Having said all that, no matter how bad each team performs, one of these two teams must reach a Leinster semi-final and whichever team succeeds in that task will no doubt come on for getting this game under their belts. Home advantage means that Wexford carry the favourites" tag into this game and as they will also carry the extra ounce of motivation from having let the league final slip between their fingers, they are marginally the more likely team of the two to carry their Leinster championship challenge on a little bit longer. For Offaly to defy that suspicion, they will need another big performance from David Kenny despite his injury and they will also need three or four forwards to step up and carry the scoring load. This doesn"t look like the type of game where it will take twenty scores to win, but it should require at least fifteen, and for that to happen the Offaly team must find nine or ten scores from play between them. If this is to happen, one suspects that the midfield partnership will have to chip in with a few scores of their own. Offaly have been getting comparatively few scores from their single digit jerseys this season, though no doubt many of those shirt-bearers would argue that they are carrying the bulk of the workload already, but nonetheless this is an area that the Offaly management must look to exploit. Wexford Park has not been a happy hunting ground for Offaly hurling teams in recent years and there is no doubt that the timing of the fixture which makes an overnight trip all but necessary will reduce the visiting crowd even further. With television coverage making the stay-at-home option all the more attractive, Offaly will expect a hostile atmosphere when they travel to the South East. The tie may be tricky and national interest may be low, however this group of Offaly hurlers have proven that they have both the hurling and the backbone to compete well, even when things are going against them, and it is that spirit which they must harness tomorrow night. Defeat is no disaster, but a win could yet set up a good year in which the progress of 2008 is consolidated. Here"s hoping that, and not a comical Wexford injury, is the most memorable aspect of tomorrow night"s match.