GAA: DAVY FITZGERALD shuffles into the press auditorium like a bomb blast survivor. These days take a toll, maybe more than is strictly healthy.
His words, when they come, don’t always make sense.
They tumble out in a cascade of weary defiance, sometimes railing against imagined slights, just as often sighing at the weight of the world.
“I’m just so tired,” he says when we ask him about his future. One look at him tells you he’s not putting it on.
His press conference felt valedictory last night, a last act in the three-year stint he’s put in down in the south-east. He took time out at one point to put on record (his words) his thanks to the county chairman for the support he got all through his time with Waterford. He even got a little winsome near the end, reminiscing about the road they’ve travelled together.
Chances are, this was goodbye.
“I remember coming down to Waterford in 2008 and people saying to me that I should stay the hell away and that there’s nothing coming through. That’s genuinely what was being said. I was being told that Waterford were finished. We won a Munster title, two Waterford Crystals, good finishes in the league, All Ireland semi-finals every year. It ain’t bad. I’m just proud to have been part of that.”
If it is the end, he can feel gratified that the side went out on their shields for him. “A lot of people were expecting another massacre today but it didn’t happen,” he said. “Sorry to disappoint some people. I’m very proud of the guys. For the lads to pick themselves up from where they were four weeks ago shows unbelievable character. I’m so proud of them.
“We had a bad day in the Munster final and came out the next day and today and gave big performances. The lads hadn’t another ounce left in them coming off the field at the end. Fair play to them because the easiest thing for them to do when we came under pressure today would have been to throw up the white flag. They could have done it and they didn’t do it. That says a lot about them.”
Of the key minute in the game – between David Herity’s save from John Mullane and Richie Hogan’s second goal – Fitzgerald was adamant that Waterford should have had one of three possible frees.
“Tommy Walsh clearly pushed our lad and there were two throws in that run of play as well. Let me say categorically that (referee) Barry Kelly had a good game. I’m not sitting here whinging. He was genuinely probably unsighted at the time and didn’t see it. What I’m saying is that the small little things make such a difference.
“If we had gone in at half-time two or three points down as opposed to six, it would have been a completely different ball game.”
If this is the end of him in Waterford, we can be sure he’ll find a home. We’ll see him back here again, raging against the machine until the fight goes out of him.
“It isn’t easy. You get stick and you have to take it. Everybody goes through it. I remember Liam Sheedy getting lambasted after the Cork game last year but fair play to him, he came back and proved the point. That’s the thing about hurling. Once you’re healthy, you get up and go again one way or the other. I’d like to think this wouldn’t be the end of me.”
Some chance.
