Philly was a player’s manager – O’Brien

Tipperary senior football captain Steven O’Brien has expressed the sympathy of the panel to the family of their much loved manager Philly Ryan following his sudden passing on Saturday.

The Ballina clubman was speaking on route to Clonmel on Monday evening to be with the Ryan family, of whom Philly’s son Shane is also a team-mate of O’Brien as goalkeeper on the Tipperary senior panel.

“It is still hard to process and very raw for the group,” he said.

“Saturday afternoon was when I first got word of it and it came through a text and you just assume it is a typo, but I called Sean O’Connor (vice-captain & Clonmel Commercials colleague of Philly) and he was so upset you start to realise it was real.”

O’Brien was retained as captain by Philly Ryan and plans were already being put in train for the 2026 campaign, including discussions on the seeding change in the Munster Championship and what action Tipperary would take on coordination with Clare, Limerick, and Waterford.

“He had been in a good bit of contact recently, particularly in terms of the new Munster seeding so we would have been over and back on that quite a bit,” O’Brien revealed.

“In fairness to Philly, no matter whatever the players wanted, the response I always got back was, if that is what ye want I will back it. He was always on our side.

“Of late, we were putting plans in place for getting back together relatively soon.”

Sadly, when they do regather in the coming weeks, they will be without a bubbly character who created an enjoyable environment which was important, particularly when positive results were hard to come by.

However, Philly’s loss to the panel is secondary to that of his family with Steven O’Brien expressing the sympathy of the squad to the Ryan family, his Anna, daughters Amy & Katie, son Shane, brothers, sisters, nephews, nieces, his grandniece Tierna, extended family and friends, his best four-legged friend Alfie, and all his family at Clonmel Commercials and the extended G.A.A. Community.