Feehan is skippering Tipp through unchartered waters

By Shane Brophy

Taking on a leadership role can be a daunting task, but it is doubly so on the back of tragedy and that is what Tipperary senior football captain Paudie Feehan has had to deal with this year.

The sudden passing of Philly Ryan in October shocked the county to the core, especially his group of players who were about to return to training ahead of his second campaign as manager.

The impact his first year in charge was in evidence at his funeral in Clonmel when every player from the panel were present to provide the guard of honour to his final resting place.

“It was very strange,” Feehan said of getting back together a couple of weeks later under new boss Niall Fitzgerald.

“He left a big hole in the dressing room. We were supposed to go back training the following week. It was a big dent in the group,” he revealed.

“It wasn’t easy for Niall to come in and it wasn’t something he thought he’d ever have to do. No one knows how to deal with that, and it has been tough on us, and we are trying to deal with it as best we can, especially Shane (Ryan) who is on the panel as well. It is really tough for him and the Clonmel guys, not only was he the Tipp football manager but he was a dire-hard Commercials man and would have been with those lads since they were ten years old.”

The players paid him the ultimate respect by sticking together for the coming year and produced their best display of the National League at Philly’s home pitch of Clonmel Sportsfield in their dismantling of Leitrim.

“It does bond you when something like that happens,” Feehan admitted.

“That was one of the main things Philly said to us at the end of last year was to try and stick together, that we were on the start of a journey last year. He loved Tipp football and that seeped into the players.

“He got a group together last year, whereas for a few years we had lads dipping in and out, but last year he got a full squad together that really wanted to play for Tipperary and when you have that you are going to retain lads.

“The guys that have come on have been keeping the some of the guys out of the panel for a couple of years off the team and is really strengthening us.”

Feehan, an All-Ireland Under 21 hurling medal winner from 2018 actually played senior hurling before he played underage, drafted into the panel by then manager Michael Ryan before joining the senior footballers in 2020, in time to make history as win the Munster Senior Football Championship for the first time in 85 years.

Feehan came on as a sub that day in Cork as he as his brother Jimmy plus Steven O’Brien are the only surviving members of the panel six years on.

“It has been a tough couple of years,” the Killenaule clubman admitted from the high of 2020 to the low of 2024 when they lost to Waterford in the Munster Championship.

“It was tough at the time as a lot of lads dropped off the panel, new lads came in and there was a lot of turnover for a couple of years but we have gotten to a stage now where we have a young group of players.

“It’s a group of quality, you can see it in training in the A v B games are so much more competitive with the B’s winning at times which hasn’t been the case over the last couple of years, so it is very encouraging to stick around for another while and hopefully that curve is going in the right direction.”

“The younger fellas have given things a real lift. Over the last couple of years, we have had strong underage teams that will always give you that little bit of hope as you get older that the team can develop. We have really seen that this year with ten of the under 20 team from last year playing in the league. They are all quality players, and you can see that through UL (Sigerson) as well with seven medals coming into the county as well, so it shows they are able to compete on a national level not just to get into a Tipperary senior football team.”