By John Harrington

Galway captain David Burke believes another year outside of the top flight of the Allianz Hurling League can help their bid to retain the Liam MacCarthy Cup.

The Tribesmen failed to win promotion from Division 1B of the League this year because of a defeat at home to Wexford, but Burke thinks that may be a blessing in disguise.

He reckons they’ll be able to blood more young players and experiment with team selection in a way that just wouldn’t be possible in the more dog-eat-dog competitive environment of Division 1A.

“A big advantage looking into next year would be that we are in Division 2 (1B) of the league, that we can try out more players and integrate them into the team that way,” said Burke.

“I think it definitely is (an advantage). When you are going into league next year you are not under as much pressure to get results and you can actually give players…I actually think it should be (that) every player has to play a certain amount of time in the league because it is way too competitive.

“You see lads even the counties in Football, just fall apart once the League is over, going into Championship. It’s just a matter of bringing whatever you can, that you’ve done good in the league into the championship and improving on the things.

“I think we have huge scope for lads obviously to get in and fight for places that bit more and they might be rewarded for what they've done this year.”

Burke believes the strength of the Galway panel this year and the effort put in by those on the fringes of it was one of the reasons why they finally ended their long wait for the Liam MacCarthy Cup this year.

And he thinks that unity of purpose was in part driven by the influence of a leadership group within the panel that Micheál Donoghue first established in 2016.

“I suppose there was a couple of us there, leadership groups set up between myself and Joe (Canning) and Padraic Mannion, Aidan Harte, Johnny Coen, a few other lads there, Colm Callanan.

“It was just them driving it really and I’ve been saying it since I came in, if players just took ownership of it on the field, I’ve definitely been saying it before, when we played Kilkenny here in the big games where we just couldn’t really deal with how to figure out how to win the game and I think we’ve improved in that massively.

“It was more just getting to know lads really and the fact that we had a couple of younger lads in and there was older lads there, it was just about a matter of building trust with every player and it really was a point of contact for me to go back to the lads and say if I wanted to get key messages across or something like that, that I said it to them before training or after it or before matches.

“It wasn’t every day, it was small things and that when they’re talking the lads can pass on that message again and it was all about just getting around the group and integrating yourself with different players and young lads and getting to know them. When it does come down to it in a battle like that they’ll trust you.”

Burke certainly led by example for Galway this year by turning in a series of inspirational performances.

By his own very high standards the only match he underperformed in was the All-Ireland SHC semi-final against Tipperary, but he used that disappointment to fuel his fire for the All-Ireland Final.

“Well I suppose as every player is their own critic, as bad as anyone else is,” says Burke.

“Like, I suppose that day we played Tipp the fact they brought Dan McCormack to midfield we have different plans obviously but he obviously threw the spanner in the works and he got on a lot of ball and Brendan (Maher) obviously had a great game as well.

“I suppose at half time myself and Johnny knew that we were definitely not performing that well and he obviously had a great second half as well to go with that.

“I was really just delighted that we got through playing ugly and not playing well and knowing myself that I would have a better game in the Final.

“And that’s what it’s all down to. It’s your own belief. It’s your own thoughts. It’s what you are telling yourself in the weeks prior to that and I didn’t train for the two weeks after that game at all. I picked up a small injury in my knee and I maybe had three or four sessions before the final and they bit of rest actually probably helped me in a way as well.

“I was probably that bit fresher than most of the boys going into the game.

“Do you know, really it was just down to that, I said look if I can get my performance up surely we will be good enough to win the game and do you know, we were.”