Round Tower ready for semi final showdown

ROUND Tower Clondalkin have reached the semi final stage of the Intermediate Hurling Championship where they are set to take on O’Tooles this coming weekend.

To be held at Monastery Road at 4:45pm this Saturday, the game is a rematch of their earlier championship encounter at the beginning of August which saw Towers just manage to prevail by a single point.

Towers come into the rematch off the back of very tight wins over Kilmacud Crokes and Good Counsel respectively since that day, picking up two point victories in each contest.

There are a number of possible reasons for why the Clondalkin side seems to have the cutting edge so far this year.

One could be the appointment of Ryan O’Dwyer as a coach, the former Tipperary and Dublin Intercounty hurler brings a wealth of experience which has stood to the team tenfold.

Coach Conan O Brion spoke on the addition of O’Dwyer.

“We are really benefitting from having Ryan O’Dwyer on board. He’s an outstanding coach and is making a huge difference. The amount of things that the players and all of us are learning from him is enormous.

Another reason could be the Leinster League, a provincial competition the club has taken part in this year, they have reached the final where they are currently awaiting a date to take on Slieve Bloom of Laois.

This has led to the team playing already 28 games this campaign where they only played 22 total last year.

While many may point to tiredness and excess work load there could be a disagreement, head coach Conan O’Brion does not share the same viewpoint.

“Those extra games in the Leinster League made a huge difference for us during the earlier part of the season as well.

‘The philosophy we’ve had this year is to have as much game time as possible for as many players as we can, to build the depth in the squad that we need in a season as long as ours.

’11 league games and seven championship group games is quite a long season.

‘It’s not a 15 player game anymore it’s a 25 player game really, that’s what you need in terms of a squad to cope over an entire season.”

“I’m a big believer that there is a big difference between fitness and match fitness.

‘I knew that as a player myself, it doesn’t matter how fit you can be in terms of doing 5km or 10km runs. You’ll know all about it 10 minutes into a championship match if you don’t have the match fitness built up. Those extra games are really important.”

“I have to say that we’ve had fantastic buy in, not just from the players but from the wider club. We’ve had huge support from the club at all levels across the adult section. We really appreciate it and are grateful for it.”