King Henry inspired by Galway’s hurling heroes!

The most successful hurler ever, Kilkenny legend Henry Shefflin has revealed what spurred him on to greatness – old video recordings of Galway’s hurling heroes of 1980!

The ten-time All-Ireland senior hurling medal winner, King Henry recalled how he would watch re-runs of Galway’s 1980 famine-ending triumph in the early hours of the morning during his college days at Waterford IT when he was supposed to be studying.

The video of that match – and the cup acceptance speech by Joe Connolly and Joe McDonagh’s rendition of the West’s Awake – proved an inspiration for the man who won eleven All-Stars during a glittering career.

He was speaking as special guest at the 53rd annual Galway Sports Stars awards on Saturday at the Galway Bay Hotel, where a Galway great of the 1980s, PJ Molloy was honoured,

Shefflin said: “I know the Hall of Fame here tonight is PJ Molloy. I was only one years of age, PJ, when you won your first All-Ireland . . . but I grew up and went to college with Damian Joyce, Shane McClearn and a few of the lads like Cathal Murray. They used to come to college and they used to bring down the DVD of The West’s Awake. I used to watch this until one or two o’clock in the morning – I wasn’t studying, unfortunately, we were watching videos of Galway winning All-Ireland titles!

“And then I went on a few years, and the great Tony Keady, who unfortunately passed away this year, and I spent a week with Joe Cooney a few years ago, out in Malawi. And again, I looked at those guys, I was nine or ten years of age at that stage, and these were the people, these were the role models that I wanted to aspire to.”

Some 18 different sports were honoured with 21 awards at this year’s event and Shefflin, who attended with his wife Deirdre, was impressed with the diversity of disciplines represented – at similar events in Kilkenny there’d be just two awards, hurling and camogie, he quipped.

See full coverage over eight pages in this week’s Connacht Tribune.