Hickey delighted to be back
June 23, 2010
Declan O'Dwyer of Dublin fights a losing battle with Noel Hickey of Kilkenny during the Leinster SHC semi-final at Croke Park - INPHO
Last Sunday's Leinster SHC semi-final win over Dublin was the All-Star full back's first championship start for the Cats since the 2008 All-Ireland final against Waterford. Over the past two years, he has undergone two operations to solve Gilmore groin injuries and his problems now seem to be finally behind him.
"Last year was a bit of a disaster with one thing after another with injuries just dragging on all year. I didn't get a really good clean run of it," Hickey said.
"It was grand this year. I've been able to train all the time after the holidays and trained all spring and it is great to get back in the team and get going again in Croke Park."
The Dunnamaggin defender's return coincided with an easier-than-expected victory over Dublin at Croke Park and he feels Anthony Daly's charges didn't do themselves any favours by playing an extra man in defence.
"We didn't know whether they were going to try it or not again on Sunday or whether they would try something different. I don't know, I suppose it kind of blocks off space maybe a bit on our forwards. Everyone has to go in to win a game. Kilkenny approach a game man for man and take on your man.
"Maybe they just have to go and line out 15 for 15 and just go out and try to win the game. Anthony usually does it when we play him actually. They probably thought it worked well enough for them in the Leinster final last year, but you know, I think at some stage you just have to go for it, 15 against 15," he said.
Hickey is expecting a much sterner test in the Leinster final on July 4 from the winners of Saturday night's semi-final replay between Galway and Offaly.
"Whoever comes out of next Saturday will have the tough games and you can't beat tough games. We'd be happy enough to have the one game and we'd be back training hard. We can kind of gauge ourselves what our form is like in training and how things are going. It doesn't really concern us too much really." Tweet
