Former Kilkenny player Noel Hickey says Limerick and Galway are the teams to watch in this year’s All Ireland championship.
The Dunnamaggin man was speaking as the league wrapped up and says Kilkenny is a step below those teams this year.
He told the Clash Act podcast that Kilkenny needs to find more players.
“At the moment, I know you could say that maybe they haven’t played the stronger teams in the league but they’re going alright, but just to be perfectly honest I suppose maybe you’re looking at Limerick and Galway I think anyway (top teams),” said Noel.
“If they could find a few more players, there weren’t too many things tried out too much in the league really, not too many new players really cropping up that you’d be saying, god they’ll really drive it on this year and add to it” he added.
Playing The Short Game
The nine-times all Ireland winner says he’s also surprised that Kilkenny has brought in the “short game” to their setup this year.
Noel says it wouldn’t be something that Brian Cody would normally be a fan of, and when asked if he thinks it would be killing Brian he said:
“Ohh I’d say so, I’d say so, definitely, it seems to be gone that way even listening to other teams training in Kilkenny and that this is the way it’s going”.
“If I was playing full back, nowadays I could hit a ball 100-120 yards up the pitch, and if I’m playing the full-back and they’re hitting the ball over and back the pitch, it gives me great time to get up on the full forward and get your position, whereas if you’re just giving that ball in, it’ll break, it’ll go hear and go there, twice as dangerous of course, if Cork win an All Ireland this year, they’ll all be gone mad pucking the ball short next year,” said Noel.
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