WATCH: Paul Hoban hails strength of Galway Senior Hurling Championship
LOUGHREA Corner-back Paul Hoban reflected on the achievement of completing a three-in-a-row, admitting that it was beyond anything he imagined when beginning his club career.
“Three in-a-row never in a million years starting out did I think we would achieve this, I’m just so happy. It’s surreal winning one county title was a mountain to climb, getting that one you thought the clock would never go and now to stand here having three county titles is a dream.
“I think it's the most competitive championship in the country to be honest, with the quarter-finals you’ve seen this year, the standard, anyone could come out on top. I don’t think there is a championship to match it.”
Loughrea were forced to show their resilience after falling six points behind in the opening half. Tommy Larkins led 0-9 to 0-3 after 23 minutes, but Kelly’s side gradually worked their way back into the contest and went into the interval trailing by just three, 0-10 to 0-7.
Hoban acknowledged the intensity brought by the East Galway challengers, but felt Loughrea had plenty left to offer after the break.
“Tommy Larkins brought a massive intensity in the first half, it was going to be very hard to keep that up. They had a couple of chances, it was 0-9 to 0-3 at one stage, we went in 0-10 to 0-7, possibly could have gone in 0-10 to 0-8 down. I wouldn’t say we were content but we were probably happy, we probably knew there was more in us and more to come in the second half.”
“I don’t think you can buy that, that’s experience, that’s being champions. I know it’s a cliche but you know coming down the stretch, it’s your locker. And credit to our bench all year, we know that we have a couple of more weapons in our lockers that we have to bring out. It all helps, there is full belief there.”
Loughrea now await the winners of the Munster Hurling Championship in the All-Ireland semi-final. Inagh Kilnamona face Thurles Sarsfields and Kilmallock take on reigning All-Ireland champions Ballygunner in the Munster semi-finals.
“It’s great to be back there, I won’t do too much thinking about it now at the moment. We probably feel we have a bit of unfinished business done, we’ll get together again, have a cut at that and see what happens,” concluded Hoban.