Lion In Wait.. For Crack At Rebels Again

Paddy Smyth likes to joke with his Dublin teammates that he could just as easily be playing in Cape Town as Thurles tomorrow.

- Pat Nolan

From the rugby stronghold of Clontarf and attending a school that is steeped in the game, all while growing up not far from Brian O’Driscoll’s home, playing senior hurling for Dublin perhaps wasn’t the most obvious sporting destination for Smyth.

“Yeah, sure I would have went to school in Belvedere, a big rugby school,” he explains. “I played Junior Cup and after that it was curtailed a bit, I had some shoulder problems.

“I slag the lads saying it, ‘I’d be over in the Lions now if it wasn’t (for hurling)...’

“Sure Brian only grew up around the corner. I could probably look into it (his house) from here. Yeah, rugby would have been one of the main influences.