Cyril Donnellan, one of the stars of Galway’s win over Offaly last weekend, ranks a Leinster medal as a huge prize for the county.
The Padraig Pearse’s clubman, who worked well at wing-forward, collecting crucial possession from puck-outs and loose play, while also shotting three points from play in the first half, says a Leinster title would mean an awful lot to the entire Galway panel.
"It’s massive. No-one from Galway has ever won a Leinster medal,” he says. “We all know the importance of it. Playing in Croke Park with Galway in a Leinster final is something to really look forward to.
“It was a great move for Galway to go into Leinster, and a Leinster medal would be as important to anyone as anything. One of our objectives at the start of the year was to try to win Leinster, and that objective is still there and we hope to achieve it on July the eighth.”
Donnellan believes it is a real opportunity to finally win a Leinster championship after four years of trying.
"We’re four years in the Leinster championship and we’ve only contested one final, in 2010. Kilkenny killed us off after 20 minutes and we would have been disappointed with it at the time. We’ve a chance to build on it now and see where it goes."
Donnellan is practical too, a Leinster final win would also mean an All-Ireland semi-final spot.
However Donnellan, who is in college training to be a second level teacher, admits Galway can cast aside any thoughts of reaching the last four the direct way if they continue to drift in and out of games.
"We’ve a young panel and we’re getting it together in stages, but we’re finding it hard to keep the tempo up and are phasing out of games at times. That’s something we need to work on. Against strong opposition, when you lull out of games, that’s when they capitalise.
"We’ve a few weeks to work on the fitness for the Leinster final, but we’re happy enough and we will be giving it our best shot.”
