By John Harrington

Hardcore Dublin hurling fans must view Con O’Callaghan’s form for Cuala in recent weeks with a pang of regret.

He has been sensational in the club’s run to Sunday’s AIB Leinster club SHC Final against O’Loughlin Gaels, hitting a combined 5-6 from play in their wins over Borris-Kilcotton and St. Mullins.

He’s clearly gifted enough to make the grade as a senioer inter-county hurler, but like so many talented dual stars from the capital before him has chosen instead to focus his energies on making the grade as a footballer at the highest level.

That meant not playing any club hurling either for most of the season, and so he only featured as a substitute in Cuala’s Dublin county semi-final and county final wins over Lucan Sarsfields and Kilmacud Crokes.

He has since started their two matches in Leinster though and has brought a whole new dimension to their attacking play.

O’Callaghan still regards himself as footballer first and foremost and will continue to follow that path, but for now he’s enjoying the scenery on this hurling detour.

“Definitely,” says O’Callaghan. “Playing with the (Dublin) footballers, it’s a really high-pressure environment, really high intensity as it should be. Going back to the club, it’s something different.

“There’s obviously huge intensity at this level but it’s refreshing to just put the football aside for a few weeks or months, and get back to…I’ve always loved playing hurling so it’s great to do what I’ve always loved doing.

“It takes pressure off and I can just enjoy myself hurling. I’m feeling good, I feel the games are helping, especially ones at high intensity.

“I played a bit against Lucan and Crokes and I’ve played the two recent matches, so I’m growing a bit. My touch is sharper than it was and I’m feeling good and fresh.”

O’Callaghan puts his high-scoring in Cuala’s last two matches down to a combination of great service from his team-mates further out the field and the fact that he’s flying under the radar to a certain extent because opposition teams are so worried about neutralising his fellow forward Mark Schutte.

You can be sure O’Loughlin Gaels won’t make the same mistake and will have a very specific plan for dealing with him on Sunday. O’Callaghan might be better known as a footballer, but the fact that he also played minor hurling for Dublin is a testament to his pedigree in the small ball code.

“The whole way up, I played both,” he says. “My brother Cian would’ve been the same until he got an injury and decided he could only play hurling.

“I always played both from Under-12 minor and I didn’t have much of a preference. My dad (Maurice) was a footballer so that might have swayed me a bit and I probably felt I had a bit more to offer in football.

“I got an injury then when I was 19, tore my patella tendon, so I was out for a year. I decided I was going to focus on U-21s football and leaving hurling aside.

“When I got a call-up to the senior footballers, I said I have to give it my full attention. You’re not going to get in that team if you're side-tracked by U-21s hurling so I put it aside at the time for football.”

If Cuala defeat O’Loughlin Gaels on Sunday and their season continues into 2017 then it’ll be interesting to see whether O’Callaghan will stick with them or else focus his energies on breaking into the Dublin football team for the early rounds of the League. It sounds like the latter might be more of a priority for him, but he’s unwilling to think too far ahead.

“I’m focusing completely on the hurling for the moment,” he says. “In terms of next year, I'd love to push on in terms of experience (with the Dublin footballers).

“I didn’t get much league time last year but hopefully I can build on what I did last year. Everyone on the panel will have ambitions to play and start for the team. hopefully I can build on the small things I’ve done this year and push on for next year.

“If you start thinking too far ahead, this match will run by us like it did last year. Maybe there were too many lads thinking about the All-Ireland semi or the Christmas break or whatever. We have to focus everything on this match.”

The manner in which they were beaten in last year’s Leinster Final by Oulart-The-Ballagh of Wexford should certainly focus Cuala minds ahead of Sunday’s match.

In that match they seemed taken aback by the intensity with which Oulart played, and found themselves eight points down at half-time. This time around they’re going in with their eyes wide open.

“Last year we felt we let ourselves down in the Leinster final so this year we’re hoping for, at the very least, an improved performance, whatever about the outcome,” says O’Callaghan.

“I suppose we waltzed into the final last year, although we’d a tough game against Clara, but we kind of just nearly expected…I don’t know what went wrong but we expected it to happened when it came down to it. It just slipped away and it’s so easy for that to happen in finals.

“We went down by six or seven points and we were just a bit stunned. I don’t know if we weren’t expecting it but Oulart had lost a couple of finals and had a lot of experience.

“They probably knew what it took to win a Leinster, and knew better than we did because they came out fighting. It was probably nearly a little too late, we tried to claw it back but it took a lot of effort and it slipped away.

“Hopefully this year we’re going to take our chances when they’re given and work hard.”

Reaching a provincial club final two years running is a serious achievement and a testament to the hard work that has taken place in the club in recent years.

They have natural resources most clubs could only dream off with over 300 kids being coached at their Hyde Road pitches every Saturday, but their success at senior level isn’t purely down to weight of numbers.

“We actually have a very tight-knit group,” says O’Callaghan. “There’d be a lot of cousins and brothers and lads who grew up together on the team.

"There was a successful under-21 team that had David Treacy and Paul Schutte and Oisin Gough, all those lads.

“In terms of success, (Manager) Mattie (Kenny) would have really brought in a competitive edge. He obviously thinks really deeply about hurling and shows in the preparation that we do.

“To be successful, you need a very good culture, lads driving it on the whole time.

“Somebody said we have one of the biggest academies in Ireland. But actually, when I was growing up, my team found it hard to keep a team together.

“I’d say we had 13 hurlers and we had to bring in lads coming up from the age group underneath us. I had great managers, Tadgh Murphy and Johnny Twomey, who brought us up the whole way.

“But they had to fight really hard to keep us together. It nearly would have fallen apart without the age group below us. And at the time, I think Crokes had three teams at our age group.

“So if we can keep up the academy and keep players involved, it will be great for the club.”