'It’s brilliant winning tonight, but the end product is to get Offaly into the MacCarthy Cup’

AT MIDDAY TODAY – if the schedule is adhered to, which is hardly a certainty – Offaly’s U20 heroes will attend what’s sure to be a packed house at Glenisk O’Connor Park for their All-Ireland winning homecoming.

“The hard work started with this bunch when they were in a Tony Forristal final . The only thing about it was we were beaten in the Forristal final by that Tipperary team and in an All-Ireland minor hurling final two years ago by that Tipperary team.” O’Connor reflected. “We’ve bad memories of 2022 down here. We let it slip and we know we did. It was very hard tonight to get word onto the field with 10 minutes to go. There was a break in play with four or five minutes to go and we were getting it out onto the field: drive on, drive on, drive on. That energy has to come and it has to come from somewhere. It came from within tonight.”

“You see how they developed tonight over the last 12 months, and they’re not finished yet,” O’Connor said. “It’s brilliant winning tonight, but really the end product is to get Offaly back into the MacCarthy Cup. You know there’s a massive task ahead next week but one I know the senior team will look forward to and I’ve no doubt they’ll meet the challenge.

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