PREVIEW: Hogan hoping his side can reach new heights in 2024 county championship

Kiladangan added their second-ever county championship to their roll of honour last year in a thrilling two-match showdown with Thurles Sarsfields, and with a North Championship added to that two weekends ago in defeat of rivals Toomevara, they look a decent bet to do the back-to-back.

The North Tipp club have never put titles together in successive seasons and when that was the challenge in 2021 after their maiden success, they fell away in the last four, but netminder Barry Hogan believes there will no difference in their approach this year.

“It doesn’t really. It is the same preparation. We train as hard as we can every night and every season,” he insisted.

“We were in a similar position in 2021 and we gave that a fair rattle, just getting pipped in a semi-final. There’s no additional pressure, we know how competitive it (championship) is so we just have to prepare as best we can and give it a rattle.

Winning the North Championship against Toomevara a few weekends ago could prove to be a big fillip for the team, having ended a run of successive final defeats the two years previous and Hogan highlighted the importance of the victory for the group.

“It’s a huge boost. We didn’t hide the fact that we wanted to win the North Championship. We lost two finals on the bounce and we were very disappointed to do so.

“Down in training on Tuesday night after the win, it was a great atmosphere below and you just can’t beat winning.

“It was important for us to get over the line because if we had to lose it would have been another final lost.

“Look, we bounced back from it last year but who knows how we would have reacted to it this year.

The hallmarks of perennial challengers in any sport or competition is familiarity and a settled playing pool and Kiladangan certainly have that in the Flynns, Gallagher, Willie Connors and Hogan himself, but the Tipperary goalkeeper highlighted that the competition amongst the training panel is stronger than ever and keeps everyone on their toes.

“It is settled but we do have good competition for places. Sean Hayes was missing the other day and we had a few other injuries throughout the North Championship and other lads stepped up and did very, very well.

“We have that bit of a blend of settled experience and young blood who have come in to freshen things up, which is important.
Clonoulty Rossmore comes into this opener in opposition of the county champions, and it could be a tricky game for Hogan and his teammates as the West side had no divisional championship involvement this year which ultimately makes them an unknown in terms of personnel and form.

“They had a very strong league and they have a very strong team every year and work hard every game they play. There is an element of knowing - to a small degree - what is to come from Clonoulty,” said Hogan.

“We played them last year in the group as well in a must-win game for us and it was a tight game. They have savage hurlers all over the field and again, you can say that they’re pretty settled too over the last number of years.

“They’ve a huge amount of experience and they all seem to be there or thereabouts come the end of the championship. So it’s a huge challenge for us in the first round,” he concluded.