By John Harrington

The pain of a torn hamstring couldn’t dull the smile on Paul Schutte’s face after Cuala’s epic AIB All-Ireland Club SHC Final replay victory over Na Piarsaigh on Saturday evening.

By winning a second All-Ireland title in a row the Dublin side have proven they’re one of the greatest club teams in the history of the game.

And for team captain Schutte, that achievement was made all the more special because they had to show such character and ability to finally overcome the challenge of a superb Na Piarsaigh side.

“I've always felt we were a great team but I suppose now you have something to back it up,” said Schutte after the match.

“It's for the rest of Ireland to see that we're a great team but I always believed in this team and so did the lads.

“If you want to be taken as a great team you have to be seen to be pushing and showing great character.

“We should have probably lost the game last week. We rode our luck a little bit but it was great character from the lads to never give up and just keep going and going and going.

“They got their tactics spot on last week. Replays are all about who can learn the most from the first game and I felt that we played on their terms last week and I felt we kind of played moreso on our terms this week.”

Darragh O’Connell was still struggling to comprehend the enormity of what Cuala had achieved in the minutes after the final whistle.

A native of Abbeydorney in North Kerry, when he joined Cuala three years ago he never dared dream of success on this scale.

“No, no, absolutely not,” he said. “ You've probably played these games in your back garden a couple of hundred times when you're a young lad.

“To actually get the opportunity, not many do. I suppose when you get that opportunity it's very important that you grasp it with two hands. Thankfully we managed to do it at the end today.

“It's incredible. Right now it's all a bit of a daze really. When we sit down in a couple of days' time and look back on it, it's a wonderful achievement. Something that we'll be very, very proud of.

“Questions have been asked all year about the hunger and character of this team. Last Sunday the game was dead and buried and we managed to pull it out of the fire.

“Again today, we got six points up and probably didn't pull them away but we showed great resolve for the last couple of minutes again to swing it our way.”

Those nerve-shredding final few minutes must have been hell for Cuala manager Mattie Kenny, which was probably why relief rather than joy seemed his dominant emotion after the match.

“Enjoying the game is for the supporters,” he said. “It’s a job of work we have to do on the sideline, to support the guys. To help in some small way with the decisions we make on the sideline.

“There’s definitely no enjoyment in it! Someone said to me that in hurling and in sport like this, you’re training and living for the 15 minutes after the match, because that’s the unbridled joy you get from a victory like that.

“The last ten minutes was epic. Sometimes we were attacking and then it would break down to their big men at the far end…they looked so dangerous.

“I was talking to the supporters there afterwards and they were saying it was real edge of the seat stuff. So look, we’re delighted to get over the line.”

Both Cuala and Na Piarsaigh served up such excitement over the course of both matches that it was a shame either had to lose it.

That was to be the Limerick team’s fate, though, and there was no disguising their devastation after the match.

They were magnanimous in defeat, though. Manager Shane O’Neill admitted it had been an epic contest and paid tribute to their conquerors Cuala.

“To be playing against a group such as Cuala over in the other dressing just shows the standard of club hurling at a higher level is just absolutely ridiculous the way it's gone,” he said.

“The physique of the guys, the pace of the hurling, the quality of it is just absolutely superb.

“We definitely know we were involved in two epic games.

“For Cuala to do back-to-back is an unbelievable achievement and they'll give three-in-a-row a right rattle as well.

“But we're extremely proud of our guys, they gave absolutely everything they had. To be six points down and go a point up showed unbelievable character.

“Our lads have got so much character, and it's been shown over the last seven, and particularly over the last four years when this management team has been involved.

“We couldn't fault them to a man. They've been just absolutely superb.”