What age would Aaron Fitz & Brandon OāConnell be?
Fitz has been around a good while, hasnāt he between hurling & football?
Fitz is 31/32, he was centre-back for the footballers for four or five seasons before switching codes. One of Eire Ogās main men in the big ball, usually plays fullback for them.
OāConnell Iām guessing maybe mid to late 20s now, I have it in my head he missed a year with a cruciate or something similar when he came out of 21s
Fitz probably should have stayed with the footballers. He is honest but a limited hurler at I/C level.
Think Brandon is in or around 26 or so - same go as Shanagher, Jason Mc etc but open to correction
OāConnell is 27 this year. Good club corner back but Iād imagine most Ballyea people would still rate the much maligned Jack Browne a lot higher and Browne was dropped. (Although i do believe that was on a disagreement with Lohan rather than based on ability.)
I donāt think there was a falling out per se but the writing was in the wall for Jack when Paudi Fitz started ahead of him against Kilkenny.
He had seen very little minutes in 2021 or 2022 championship. He is still worth his place on the panel but his days as a starter were gone.
He is an excellent club hurler in fairness to him
The writing was on the wall for Clare when Paidi started against Kilkenny.
Squeaky posterior time
Clare 1-9
Limerick 0-12
Limerick a point up
He was a walking yellow card
Limerick miss a good chance from a mark, five left, all square
Clare go a point up
Brian Donovan shot stopped by Stephen Ryan, Daniel Walsh puts Clare two up
Emmet McMahon drives one over from just inside the 45, three point cushion
Cillian Rouine makes it four, OāDonovan for Limerick pegs it back to three
Full-time
Clare 1-16
Limerick 0-16
Sounded a fine game on the radio. Would have been a huge deflation to have lost that after beating Cork two weeks ago
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Unchanged from the last day. Think Clune is lucky to be retained, they picked him to man mark Ben Cunningham and was soundly beaten. Niall OāFarrell hit 4 points the first day out v Tipp thought they might start him but think they want Smyth at half forward as a puckout option, he is better at 14 but we are probably better balanced with him at wing forward.
Clare pucking this away with bad wides.
John Conneally is class
He will make a fine corner back
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