During those unforgettable years when Ger Loughnane managed Clare, he was notorious for magnifying any perceived slight against Clare, no matter how unwitting or innocuous, and endlessly mining it for motivational purposes.
The most famous instance being Nicky English's apparently disrespectful smile and chuckle to a teammate after popping over a point late in the 1993 Munster Final, a game in which Tipperary hammered Clare into oblivion. According to Anthony Daly, Loughnane was still harking back to this 'incident' in 1999.
It seems strange then that Loughnane would offer a similarly motivational speech to the Galway players, knowing, as he must have, there was a fair chance they were going to run into Clare in the All-Ireland quarter-final.
Davy Fitzgerald is certainly baffled. Not to mention exasperated. He gave a very interesting and wide-ranging interview to Joe Molloy on Off the Ball tonight.
Ger musta had a fair idea Clare could end up playing Galway in the next match. And for a Clare man to say that, it's, Jesus, it's tough enough for us to beat Galway without thinking that that's what we think.
Them Galway lads have been to two All-Irelands in 2012 and 2015. They've won a Leinster championship, like. That's not a bad return. There isn't too many teams in the country that have that return.
I'll always have great time for Ger Loughnane for what he did for us in Clare. Sometimes I just don't know why he does stuff like that, whether it's to keep in the media or something like that.
Certainly, for myself and the Clare management, I don't think we agree with that. And I think the facts stand for themselves. If you reach two All-Ireland finals and win a Leinster, you can't be a really bad team.
We don't know whether Ger will hit back at Davy or return to his current favourite theme of 'Galway's gutlessness'. Perhaps, he'll slap a Galway ban on himself in the interest of ensuring that Clare don't face the frenzied, angry blowback on Sunday week.
But then Ger is an inveterate pot-stirrer and he seemed to acquire a very low opinion of the character of the Galway hurlers during his time as manager there. He may not be able to stay away.
