Forty-six minutes have gone in the All Ireland senior hurling semi-final between Cork and Galway. It has been the tense, edgy affair it was predicted to be. Cork’s youth and vigour is just about hanging on to the greater power of the tribesman.
Iarla Tannion sweeps a pass down the left hand channel over Joe Canning’s head. Joe caresses the slothar onto his hurl like it is a water balloon. It meets the centre like a sparrow returning to its nest. He is met by corner back Brian Murphy and centre-back Eoin Cadagan. They envelop Canning like two bouncers, Canning falls, gets up, runs past Murphy and swats aside Cadagan before flicking the ball inside. Youth, vigour and power. “Lording it”, is what it’s called.
The late novelist David Foster Wallace once wrote what is now a seminal essay on Rodger Federer. In it, he details Federer moments. “These are times, as you watch the young Swiss play, when the jaw drops and eyes protrude and sounds are made that bring spouses in from other rooms to see if you’re O.K.” I had my first Canning moment during the 2006 All Ireland Club final. His club Portumna were taking on the reigning champions from Cork; Newtown.
I was fortunate enough to spend a great summer lugging blocks around Newtown the previous year. It was the beginning of an incredible run that took them to an All Ireland title. Ben and Jerry O’Connor were in their pomp. Pint-sized, point scoring machines. Pat Mulcahy had a tracker beam of a hand at centre-back. He played corner back for Cork too so if the occasion demanded physicality, Pat was more than happy to dish it out.
Three minutes into the 2006 final, a gangly kid of eighteen eviscerated Mulcahy and two other Newtown defenders and slammed the ball into the net. Jaw dropped, eyes protruding and incredulous laughter.
Of course I had heard stories of Olly’s brother. The freak minor who would be a star, but this was Newtown. The Cork club games equivalent of Hell’s Kitchen. The Kid toyed with them after, he never missed a free, he set up Portumna’s second with a mazy run and dink to Niall Hayes and he forced a tyrannical hold on the game. The normally unflappable Mulcahy was sent-off with ten minutes left, a beaten man. The Kid batted away Newtown’s final air assault in stoppage time.
The next step was onto intercounty immortality but Joe made us wait. He initially turned down the chance to join with Galway’s senior panel preferring to concentrate on being minor captain. When he did join the panel in 2008 his start was by his standards more Ferrer than Federer. He was still Galway’s top scorer in both championship games he started but judgement on The Kid had to be held until he met serious opposition.
So it was his third championship game that Joe decided he would impose his will on this senior thing. Cork met Galway in the first round of the 2008 qualifiers down in Thurles. Ten minutes in the sliothar rains down on The Kid who is being marked touch-tight by The Rock; Diarmuid O’Sullivan. The granite-jawed wonder from Cloyne who left many a full forward petrified upon seeing him. The Kid plucked the sliothar from the sky, went around The Rock like water and rifled the ball past a helpless Donal Og Cusack.
Cork tried everything to contain him that day, John Gardiner went back to deal with him and was taken for five points. He finished with 2-10 and on the losing side. But he was launched into the stratosphere. “Joe” would be all that was needed after that.
The following season failed to match those dizzying heights. You are loathe to use the word slump. Growing pains is more palatable. Joe still put numbers that any normal forward would be stapling to his forehead. Great expectations became unreasonable expectations and he even admitted himself that his fitness and conditioning wasn’t what it should have been. There were still outrageous moments. His reverse hand pass against Cork left All Star defenders looking like mugs but we were left waiting for him to dominate like he could. Perhaps he was waiting for the supporting cast in Galway to offer him the stage.
This year, Galway’s frightening intensity allied to players having the year of their careers has finally offered Joe the chance of taking in the big one. He was the spearhead in the culling of Kilkenny in the Leinster final but it was noticeable just how confident others such as Damien Hayes stepped up in the Joe show. Against Cork however, he was the defining player on the pitch. Pinching points, hooking clearances and winning dirty ball.
On Sunday he will face a Kilkenny side that will have ravenous eyes on him. This week Brian Cody is telling some of the greatest defenders that have ever played to demolish him. Break him. Beat Joe and you beat Galway. JJ Delaney was an absentee from that fateful Leinster final. He has not yet been scarred by marking Joe. Delaney, arguably has never been scarred in his career. It is one defined by him catching balls, making blocks and sapping the will of his opponent. He has never faced a challenge of this scale though. When eighty thousand fans scream the house down at HQ tomorrow Joe will saunter over to Delaney. They will share the briefest of handshakes. Contact made thereafter will come with a warning.
At the opposite end of the pitch will stand a King ready to pass an immortal. Henry Shefflin is one All Ireland medal away from passing out Christy Ring and no-one is more fitting of the honour. That he may be denied by a Canning moment however would be a fitting link in the chain of the three.
