A special day for the Kenny household in east Mayo village
Stuart Tynan
This has been a week like no other for all connected with Tooreen Hurling Club, and in the Kenny household more than most.
Austin Kenny, the newly-elected secretary of Tooreen and the father of current players David and Sean, will be in Croke Park tomorrow (Saturday) evening hoping to see his two sons become part of history when they take on Monaleen in the All-Ireland intermediate club championship final.
“As incoming secretary, it’s a busy place to be,” said Austin. “We’ve a good background of people involved with the club driving it on. Normally the first week of January, your head would be on the pillow.
“The outgoing secretary, Orla Groarke, is carrying on with a lot of the duties. We’re so lucky we have ladies involved with the club. She’s a Trojan worker and we’re so happy she continues to help. She’s really carrying the can. There’s a lot of jobs doled out.”
Austin, who will also be involved at pitchside this weekend on first aid duty, was born and bred in the small east Mayo village and has lived there all his life. From a farming background, he didn’t play hurling although he was a keen basketball player and footballer, playing with neighbouring parish Aghamore.
The Kenny house is 'a hurling house and a sports house', and he later got involved when his sons began playing at a young age. It’s no surprise to him why guys like David and Sean develop a love for the game.
“Hurling, for any young guy, it’s the skill of the game that they love. From my own involvement in watching young guys develop, there are so many skills and it’s about developing skills. When a young guy comes to a session and can’t catch a ball and can’t solo a ball, he goes home and practices it for the next day. It’s the passion that arrives from the achievement of the skills at a young age. The camaraderie keeps them coming back for more.”
One member of the Kenny family who will be cheering the boys on as passionately as anyone else is 101-year-old Johnny Meehan, David and Sean’s grandad, and Austin said he’ll be hanging on the edge of the radio to see how the guys do.
What this team will eventually achieve, only time will tell. Austin believes the ultimate legacy of this team will be what they leave behind, like the greats before them.
“For me, for my involvement in teams, both successful and unsuccessful, I think success is a very fickle thing. Success for this group might not even be measured yet in terms of where they might end up, whether they win this game, go back at it again.
“The big thing is the legacy is what this particular group leave behind. The stalwarts of our club have taken brave decisions down the years along the way to have our facilities right. It’s the legacy of this group now is what I’d look towards,“ Austin concluded.