*Éire Óg captain Aaron Fitzgerald. Photograph: Mike Brennan
EVERYTHING THAT Éire Óg’s footballers did in 2024 was based on workrate, said winning captain Aaron Fitzgerald.
Éire Óg set out at the start of the season with six steps to get through and they completed the sixth in the rain at Cusack Park on Sunday
Speaking shortly after Fergal O’Brien had sounded the final whistle in the 2024 TUS senior football championship final a delighted team captain Aaron Fitzgerald explained that their target from the start of the season was to win back the Jack Daly trophy and to achieve that required winning six games.
“The way things happened last year, we took our eye off the ball and I suppose we just wanted to right the wrongs from last year. We said we would take it game by game, step by step. We based everything on workrate and I think that showed up trumps in the last few minutes today”, the full back said.
As he signed autographs for delighted young Éire Óg fans amidst receiving congratulations from supporters, the three time Clare SFC winner said, “it wasn’t an ideal day for football, KIlmurry started well and, to be honest, we were under a bit of pressure for a whole but we know the players we have and we know what they are capable of. We stuck to the process and that is what won it for us in the end”.
Asked if it has been difficult to maintain the hunger given that he is one of a number of dual players in the side he said “no it has not at all when you have a manager like Paul Madden and the way he looks after things we could keep going all year round if we had to”.
Munster awaits for the Townies who will have a home fixture against the Limerick champions. “We have another competition now for the Munster title. We will take it game by game and see where that will take us. We haven’t looked at anything past this. We will enjoy this for a day or two and we will look at Munster then. We will enjoy the club tonight and we will go to a couple of our sponsors tomorrow before getting back to training later in the week”.
