REACTION: Gearoid O'Connor form raises big conundrum for Liam Cahill and his backroom team

Gearoid O’Connor continued his rich vein of form and his transformation into a prolific scoring forward at intercounty level with a not-too-shabby total of 1-13 nestled comfortably beside his name by the end of Sunday’s win over Galway.

The Moyne Templetuohy man was top-class all game and in the form, he is in currently, he will be giving Liam Cahill and his selectors a welcomed headache over who takes hold of the free-taking duties once Jason Forde returns to the fold in a few weeks; O’Connor missing just one free all game.

“Yeah, I suppose I was just lucky today,” O’Connor reflected on his free-taking.

“Some days they go over for you but I’ve had plenty of days where none of them went over and you’d have the head down.”

Still in the throes of his search for a third Fitzgibbon Cup winners medal with the University of Limerick, O’Connor has been juggling his third-level commitments with the return of the intercounty fare but he isn’t in the least bit daunted by the number of games he is playing. Quite the opposite.

“I think it’s great, to be honest. I don’t have to train on a Tuesday night so I’m missing out on all the running and really, any player just wants to be playing matches,” he quipped.

“To be fair, the lads are very accommodating - both sets of management - are very good at linking over to each other. I’m just happy to be able to play all these matches and for me, the more the better.

Another weapon he added to his arsenal of placed ball skills was shown late on when he blasted a late penalty past Darach Fahy to seal the win, and despite many expecting him to take the point to make it a three-point game, it perhaps shows the confident vein of form he is in now that he went for the major and it went someway to paying back Galway for last June’s championship exit in Limerick.

“I didn’t know what to do stepping up to it but then I decided to goal for goal and thankfully it went it.

“Other days it could have been saved because I went straight down the middle, so we’re just happy to get the win today.

“We haven’t forgotten about last June when Galway knocked us out of the championship and to be fair, they came very strong around the middle of the second half; I think they could have tipped over six or seven points on the go.

“But look, we were lucky we tailed it back there and I suppose there was a bit of emotion when we went two or three up, so we were happy to get over the line,” he said.

All those placed balls were vital come the end of the game but perhaps, Tipp would have been a little more comfortable had they converted a flurry of goal chances in the first half, with at least two green flags left behind and that is something which O’Connor pointed toward post-match.

“In a way, we were disappointed that we didn’t convert them (goal chances) but we were very happy that we were making the goal chances. Today I suppose we were just unlucky the way the ball broke today.

“We let Galway into the game a bit in the second half and we just about managed to claw it back at the end but we could have easily got in a good bit ahead at half time so there is plenty to work on over the next few weeks.” he finished.