By John Harrington

At Monday’s launch of GAAGO’s 2024 championship broadcast schedule, the four hurling analysts present – John ‘Bubbles’ O’Dwyer, Seamus Hickey, Eoin Cadogan, and Richie Hogan – were asked in a top-table Q&A session who they thought would win next year’s All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship.

Interviewer Gráinne McElwain prefaced that question by saying “I think I know what your answers are going to be”, but Richie Hogan didn’t deliver the line she expected.

“Kilkenny are going to win the All-Ireland”, he said without a moment’s hesitation.

O’Dwyer, Hickey, and Cadogan all opted for the more predictable option of five-in-a-row chasing Limerick, so why is Hogan so confident that his former Kilkenny team-mates can go all the way in 2024?

Limerick are clearly favourites and would I be surprised if Limerick win it? Not in the slightest. And they're rightly favourites. But I just think Kilkenny have the greatest capacity for improvement,” said Hogan after the launch.

“Clare were very strong and have Limerick's number. Or seem to have Limerick's number. Maybe they haven't beaten them that often, but they've certainly put it up to them every single time. I think if Kilkenny can learn a little bit from that then they should be able to get over the line.

“A few of the guys who came in last year should improve too. Mikey Carey is back, Billy Drennan should get a bit better and get on that starting team. David Blanchfield who was a huge loss in the All-Ireland Final will be back and hopefully bigger and stronger.

“The O'Loughlins guys are hurling particularly well. Mikey Butler and Huw Lawlor are outstanding players and will get better. Mikey Butler is still only starting out his career. And I think Eoin Cody and Adrian Mullen have more capacity to improve as well.

“So that's what I'm basing it on. While people would have looked at Clare, I think people are looking at Clare because they put it up to Limerick. But Kilkenny have beaten Clare now twice in a row. While last year it was closer, the two of them were quite comfortable wins. They never really looked like losing.

“So, yeah, I think if Kilkenny can keep things ticking over until they get to the latter stages, the quarter-finals/semi-finals, and then really focus on trying to get the best out of the group that they have. Now, injuries can cause issues and all the rest of it, but I just think they have the greatest capacity to improve.”

Back in 2010 Hogan was part of a Kilkenny team whose own attempt to win five championships in a row was stopped by Tipperary in the All-Ireland Final.

There was huge hype around the ‘Drive for Five’ in the lead up to that match, and Hogan believes the it’ll be a factor again for Limerick in 2024. His advice is that they should embrace the opportunity to create history rather than shy away from it.

“It'll definitely be a factor and it should be a factor for them,” he says. “There's this GAA or Irish kind of, I don't know what it is, but there's this mindset that you shouldn't talk about these things. You can concentrate on what you're doing while still realising there's the opportunity to create some form of history in hurling.

“We hid that a little bit, I think, in 2010. And I'd say that would be a mistake because the supporters are going to do it anyway. I think it would be foolish of them not to talk about it themselves and address it and then move on and concentrate on the game in hand.

“Because clearly you can't win five-in-row today, you can only win it if you get to the second or third week in July. So they won't worry about it until then, but they'll definitely address it. They should do.”

A popular debate among hurling afficionados is to settle on the combined XV between the Kilkenny and Limerick four-in-a-row hurling teams.

Both sides boast generational talents, but Hogan sees more contrast than comparison.

“I think the two teams are extraordinarily different,” he says.

“I think Limerick have the ability to lose a lot of players and still be just as good. They lost Cian Lynch, Gearoid Hegarty has gone through large periods of not being in good form, they lost Declan Hannon, they lost Sean Finn, and it doesn't make much difference to them.

“The difference I think between this Limerick team and the Kilkenny team of that era is we were a team of great players. You even look at our bench that time, we had incredible talent.

“I think the difference between us and Limerick is that Limerick have this fantastic system and they can fit anybody into that. They all understand the different roles. So I don't think they're as dependent on the ability of the players as we possibly were.

“Tipperary came with a very strong team who were able to match our players 1 v 1. But I think Limerick's system, everything that goes on behind the scenes in Limerick, is obviously a step ahead of most.

“So I don't see injuries affecting them. There's huge differences between the two teams.”

Over the course of 17 seasons hurling with Kilkenny, Hogan won seven All-Ireland titles, 11 Leinster championships, five Allianz Hurling League medals, and four All-Stars.

He has some regrets about the second half of his career when Kilkenny were less successful and he was hindered by a chronic back injury, but overall he knows he had a very good innings.

“Looking back, I'm hugely content that I had a brilliant career,” he says. “I would have loved if it was a little bit better but I think everyone is possibly like that. You possibly look at the ones that you lost instead of looking at the ones that you won.

“For me, I think because my career was the way it was where the first ten years were filled with success it was brilliant. And then the remaining seven seasons we didn't win anything. And the last couple...I struggled with injury for a while...but certainly the last couple I struggled with game-time as well as injury.

“If you had flipped that around it would still be the same career but you'd feel a lot happier. If you look at Stephen Cluxton, he didn't win anything until he was in his thirties and now he's the most successful player to have ever played.

“And you see others who finish very strong and have had a huge amount of time at the start when they won nothing. It's a human thing, you look at the recent past moreso.

“But when I reflect on my whole career I'm pretty content that I did well. And, also, I think given the cards I was dealt I got the most I could out of it.

“I would have loved to have done a little bit more, but, when I look back at the years that I had and how hard I tried to get back, and there's many times when I could have walked away, I'm pretty content now that nobody will tell me I left too soon, that's for sure.”