Naas hurling captain Brian Byrne on why this championship win is different

There’s not too many players, football or hurling, who have made a habit of regularly lifting trophies in Croke Park, but Brian Byrne is part of that select group.

As Kildare captain, he was the first man to get his hands on the Christy Ring Cup in 2018 and 2020, and on Saturday he swapped out the Lilywhite jersey for blue and white hoops and still ended his day on Jones Road with silverware.
While every victory for club or county means something in its own right, both as a standalone success story and as a marker on the road to progress, it’s clear that the closeness of this Kildare group made Saturday a very different experience for the dual player.

“Every title is different in its own way. Kildare titles are Kildare titles with a different bunch of guys but I think this one is very special, and very close to the top of everything I’ve ever done. To see what it means to the Naas people out there is incredible, and family is a big thing with this team” he said.

“No matter what, when I went home they were going to say they were very proud of what went on, but to come home with a bit of silverware, to really make them proud, that’s right at the top.
“The captain thing, without any disrespect to it, it’s not something we pay a lot of attention to. There’s 36 leaders out there, they have the full interest of the team at the top of everything and my job is a lot easier when you’ve got guys like that around the team”.

Byrne spoke of the moment at the end of the game when the whistle sounded, and a remarkable journey with this Naas group had finally come to the fairytale ending that they all craved.

“When he blew, I thought I’d overcarried it and it was ‘oh no’ but he gave a second whistle and I knew it was full time. There’s a sense of relief in that situation because you’re battling to the end, but it’s relief, and then absolute joy.
“It’s been a long season for a lot of those guys. We didn’t play our 2020 final until the summer so we had to train through Covid because we didn’t know whether club or county would come first. Guys went back into the county so the club guys had to keep training while we weren’t there. It’s been a long hard couple of years now, so there’ll be a bit of a break before we think of anything else, and we have to savour this – for the club, for the players and for the community, it’s wonderful.”

It's been an incredible time for Naas hurling, but also for Naas football, who climbed back to the top of the tree and reached a Leinster final. Many coaches would say that doing both is impossible but Byrne argues that one sport feeds off the other, when the culture allows.

“The football journey was fantastic as well” he said. For Naas as a whole, the past months have been unbelievable, the whole town is behind this. Shop windows painted, businesses behind us, flags and lights everywhere, even when you’d be flicking through twitter to take your mind off the match, all the other clubs in Kildare are wishing Naas the best of luck. It was a big Kildare effort over the past two weeks, and I’m delighted to be able to do Kildare proud.
“For us to get over the senior final in Kildare was a long hard road, but we got there and then we started looking towards Leinster. Tullaroan (in 2019) was a big setback for us, we took a lot from that day, and those players made a promise to get back there, and we did. This is where it’s got us."