Tony Keady – hurling legend who rose to every challenge

IT was in the Westpark Hotel, Portumna in the early eighties that I first came across Tony Keady. Being on the border, us Tipp lads regularly made the short hop across the Shannon on Saturday nights in an era where showbands were tops of the pops.

On one particular night, I think Samba and the Philosophers were belting out the hits in the Westpark when there was an almighty din on the dance floor. Curious revellers made their way over to see what the commotion was – it was Keady strutting his stuff.

You’d swear a herd of charging buffalo were on the premises, but it was just Keady, alone inside a circle and probably surrounded by his Killimordaly buddies, doing a very noisy impression of Michael Jackson by hammering his boots off the floor. It was high-energy stuff and the crowd loved it.

That was the thing about Tony, who was already starting to make a name for himself as a hurler back then. He had zero self-awareness and loved the attention in that almost disarming style of his.

A few years ago, we played golf together in a Media West outing in Ballinasloe. We both fancied ourselves as long hitters and it soon became a contest to see which of us could drive the furthest. It didn’t matter whether the ball ended up in trees or heavy rough.

On the 18^th, both our drives went seriously off-course, landing in trees down the right-hand side of the fairway. After finding our errant strokes, Tony turned to me and said: ‘Johnny, I have you there’. It didn’t matter that we both had virtually unplayable lies: his ball had gone further than mine. Our playing partners were not amused.

Subsequently, he made an approach about ghost writing his autobiography. Though honoured, I just wasn’t in a position to commit to a project which undoubtedly would have been both fulfilling and eye-opening. Even so, it was tough turning him down, especially as in Tony’s own words: ‘Johnny, it will be a great story, a best seller’.

Back in early 1987, after falling out of favour with the Babs Keating led Tipperary management, Galway boss Cyril Farrell made an approach about throwing in my lot with them. Leaving aside that transferring from Lorrha was non-negotiable, where would I have been going anyway with Tony Keady holding down the number six maroon jersey with such authority.

Full tribute in this week’s Connacht Tribune.