It’s a long way between Ardrahan and the Bronx and Croke Park, or is it? Not when Galway haven’t won an All-Ireland hurling title in 29 years and Johnny Glynn is both wanted and wants to be on the trail of it.
And now that the title is won, every inch of that 3,000-mile commute feels worthwhile. Only Glynn insists it was all about the journey and not the destination, and that win or lose to Waterford on Sunday, the sacrifice was nothing compared to what Galway hurling meant in return.
“No, there was never a guarantee,” says Glynn, beaming in the lobby of the team hotel at CityWest, before the short western homecoming. “I’m six years playing with Galway, and two All-Irelands lost. Eventually I won one on Sunday, and hopefully it won’t be the last, but you just don’t know.
“So win or lose, if Galway ring you to come home, you’re not going to turn your nose up at it. Galway is my county, that’s where I grew up, you’re never going to tell them ‘go away’.”
That call came last April, at which stage Glynn had been almost two years in New York. He left the week after the 2015 final defeat to Kilkenny, promptly settled in the Yonkers area of the Bronx with his girlfriend, and began working as a project manager with Topline DryWall, run by two Leitrim men, Jonathan Kenny and Pádraig McGourty.
“I wanted a year out anyway,” he says. “The girlfriend and I decided we wanted to do the year, see how it goes. You don’t know if you don’t try. Johnny and Pádraig opened it [TopLine] maybe five or six years ago, and I started there since I went over in the last two years, and I’m still there. The boys are sound, we work hard, and enjoy it.”
So last summer, instead of playing hurling with Galway, Glynn played football with New York: “Well, some people who saw me last year, I don’t know if they’d call it playing football. Beyond the pitch, that was about the height of it. It wasn’t football anyway.”
Still, even when that call came from Galway manager Micheál Donoghue, no one was sure how the logistics of the commute would work out. It drew immediate comparison to the similarly bold initiative made by Pete Finnerty and Gerry McInerney, who starred on Galway’s 1987 and ’88 All-Ireland-winning teams, while living in New York. Only then Galway were parachuted in at the semi-final stage.
League final
Glynn was back for the league final at the of April, then commuted from JFK to Shannon as dictated by the need, and the diary: “It worked out in that when the management rang me and asked would I come back, the two boys I work for, Johnny and Pádraig, allowed me come back,” he says.
“I honestly don’t know how many trips it’s been. I’d have to look at the passport. A good few months, about three months, back and forth. I came back about four weeks before the semi-final, went back to New York for a few days after, then back here for the last four weeks. So yeah, it went quick, you could say that.
“And Micheál is straight up, would never want to hide anything. To be honest it wasn’t really a sacrifice. It’s easily done. It’s probably more hassle driving from Cork to Belfast, if you think of it that way. It’s only a few hours flight, into Shannon, and my home house is only 20 minutes from there. My dad Martin is always there to pick me up.”
Sunday didn’t go exactly to plan; starting for the first time this summer, Glynn was held under high security by Waterford’s Barry Coughlan: “Delighted yeah, I was starting, but I don’t know if I was just wrestling for the first half. Because I wasn’t playing hurling for sure anyway. But for the players, and everyone, you saw how happy it was, it’s just great.”
The Bronx is now considered home from home. Glynn will be back at work next week, but isn’t sure yet if the commute is viable long-term.
“If you’re American around there, they’d ask what are you doing here. It’s nearly all Irish. So you’d surely find a few boys to puck about, and I’m involved with a few teams over there as well.
“It’s good craic, but you try to fill the gap with hurling, and it’s awful hard not to be involved in something like that, no matter what lifestyle is involved. That [Sunday] was something special.
“We’ve been 29 years waiting for Liam MacCarthy, we’ll enjoy this one for now, take that as it comes. There’s a big Galway crew over there too, but since I’ve come back, back in April, the amount of messages . . . In New York, the one thing is, everyone cares, if you’re Irish everyone loves to look after the Irish, and it showed there the last few weeks, all the messages and texts and phone calls.”
