Martin comerford Retires

adrian522

Martin Comerford has retired from inter county hurling,

Personally I'm sad to see him go as I felt he still had something to offer.

He's had a great career, scoring crucial goals in all Ireland finals against both Cork and Tipperary in games that seemed to be getting away from Kilkenny.

I think this is a blow to Kilkenny as we are not blessed with too many ball winning forwards at present as was seen in league final defeat.

Link:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/sport/2011/0513/1224296837965.html

2Scoops

Sad news because he still has plenty to offer. But best of luck to him - great memories of Gorta scoring in tough games and a sound chap as well.

eigrod

Tá an Ghorta thart !

Good luck to him in his retirement.

An Citeog

I thought he still had a lot to offer. He was/is a top class hurler and always seemed to stand up and be counted when Kilkenny were most in need.

aidan24326

Was the workhorse of the Kilkenny forward line, didn't have the same class as a few of the others but you need players like that all the same. Players that will do the spade work. It seems to be an increasing trend that players are retiring relatively young now. I think these days too much is expected of county players considering they're officially amateurs. I think once lads start settling down and having kids and all that stuff they just haven't the time to give to it anymore, which is hardly surprising when you consider the amount of committment it involves.

ShamoBuc

Delighted he's gone. He was an often underrated hurler, very much capable of changing a game with his scores or presence. I'm convinced kk would have 2 less AI's and Tip and cork would have one more each, were it not for him.
Fine hurler.

Cleanman

aidan24326 wrote: »

Was the workhorse of the Kilkenny forward line, didn't have the same class as a few of the others but you need players like that all the same. Players that will do the spade work. It seems to be an increasing trend that players are retiring relatively young now. I think these days too much is expected of county players considering they're officially amateurs. I think once lads start settling down and having kids and all that stuff they just haven't the time to give to it anymore, which is hardly surprising when you consider the amount of committment it involves.

Agree with this comment though I think a little harsh to call him a work horse! If he was on any other team in the country, he would have been the focal point of their attack, a class hurler and I'm sad to see him go. Best of luck to him in retirement.

On early retirement, it seems that marriage seriously curtails the lifetime of a man's intercounty career (bearing in mind that most guys don't get married now until they're in their 30's) It would be interesting to get statistics on the amount of county players (football and hurling) that are married and have kids. I'd hazard a guess that it's a small percentage. Even at club level, not many players are married. Not one in my my club:eek:

dastardly00

I'm sad to see him to retire firstly because he is a great skillful player and secondly he could have been a good asset to the KK panel this year.

Martin won 6 All-Ireland SH medals, 9 Leinster SH medals, 5 NHL medals, 3 All-Star awards and 1 U21 All-Ireland medal. What a career.
Also, it just shows that you can still become a brilliant player even if you don't win any schools/colleges/minor medals.

red menace

Class hurler and will be missed
Never short of a witty saying or two either

Kojak

He will be a loss to KK, especially the impact that he could make when being used as a substitute mid way through a second half. It didn't look like Cody was going to be using him in his starting 15 and maybe Comerford thought that, because of that, he had enough of inter-county hurling.

While I'm not saying that KK are in serious decline, they have lost a few very experienced heads over the last while. This loss in strength in depth could be a negative factor for them later in the year when they meet Tipp (probably in the All-Ireland final).