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09 April 2008
....the news of Davy Fitz’s retirement broke. This one didn’t hit me like the retirement of Sean McMahon and Brian Lohan, but he was still part of the team of legends. (I can tell you the place and time of the day it was when I heard about Lohan!) Love him or hate him, what a brilliant goalkeeper he was. I saw this little man playing U-12 V’s Newmarket in Kilkishen in 1982. The jersey was so big for him that a lot of the number 1 on his back was down inside his togs. I wouldn’t recall him if he hadn’t made one cheeky stop by discreetly throwing his hurley and stopping a certain goal during that game. He really came to notoriety when he went to Flannan’s and became the number 1 all the way up through the ranks. It was during these teen years that this man became really driven. At one point in Flannans he has a broken arm. To keep his eye in and keep his place on the team he had a short light hurley made for him. He proceeded to train on his own every day for several weeks in the handball alleys. No problems with motivation or obstacles…. He picked up U-16 and minor Munster Championships with Clare along the way and played in the 1989 All Ireland Minor Final with Conor Clancy and our own Pat Markham versus the Brian Whelehan/ Johnny Dooley Offaly team. This was the beginning of a trail of big game defeats at U21 and Senior level between 89 and 94 that made men, real men, of Clare Players for 1995. His goal from the penalty in ’95 in Thurles was the first moment in my lifetime that I believed we could break the duck of 63 years without a win in Munster. On the radio this evening with Des Cahill he recalled his father’s emotion at the whole experience of that particular day. Fitz and that team know that thousands of us will literally die happy after that 1 hour in the sun. The rest of the journey was just a celebration of that one. Is this the last chapter? I wouldn’t think so. The little man has now become a highly respected General on the sidelines with LIT and various club teams.
If he can douse the flames that still burn within once the ball is thrown in then he may yet become a coach at inter county level. Won’t the media just love getting him back at the microphone?!
Duine Eile
