When Mattie Kenny and Greg Kennedy perused this year’s Leinster Championship fixtures schedule, they would have reckoned on a pivotal game against their native Galway to close out the round robin phase.
With a likely victory against Carlow always going to be enough to keep them in the running come this stage, it comes down what is essentially a must-win game for them this evening.
A draw would only be enough for Dublin if there’s a nine-point win for Kilkenny at Wexford Park.
Although he played for Galway, Kenny’s reputation has been largely forged in coaching and he was a key part of Anthony Cunningham’s management team when Galway won their first Leinster title in 2012 and pushed Kilkenny to a replay in the All-Ireland final.
There was a fracture in the set up thereafter, however, and Kenny later ran unsuccessfully against Cunningham for the Galway job in 2014 and lost out again the following year when incumbent Micheal Donoghue was appointed.
He then enjoyed historic success with Cuala, but becoming the first man to lead a Dublin club to All-Ireland success wasn’t enough to earn him the county job ahead of Pat Gilroy in 2017, though he was appointed late last year after Gilroy stood down, Kenny having successfully retained the Tommy Moore Cup with the Dalkey outfit in the meantime.
His right-hand man with Cuala was Kennedy, who came with him to Dublin and achieved notoriety after interfering with play in his role as the team runner during last month’s defeat to Kilkenny, earning a four-week ban.
Kennedy had a more notable playing career than Kenny, captaining Galway to the All-Ireland minor title in 1994 and playing in the senior final seven years later when they lost to Tipperary.
The game is not as critical for Galway this evening after their victory over Kilkenny given that if they were to lose, only a draw in Wexford Park would see them eliminated.
From a Dublin point of view, this tie appears to be a lot less winnable now than it was even a week ago, the 2017 All-Ireland champions having turned in by far their best performance of the year to beat Kilkenny at Nowlan Park after it appeared that they were slipping into terminal decline.
“If that is our standard now, we have to keep raising it,” said Donoghue after last Sunday’s one-point victory.
Rediscovering their form is one thing, maintaining and “raising it” through the rest of the campaign is another matter entirely but, for now at least, you’d imagine that Galway will have got enough of a bounce from last Sunday to carry them past Dublin.
VERDICT: Galway
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