It’s a hectic programme juggling county and college duties, but like his college team-mate Mark Rodgers, Gearóid is embracing it.
Wednesday's Fitzgibbon Cup semi-final will mark Gearóid O’Connor’s ninth game in 31 days but you won’t hear a moan out of him.
Between UL and Tipperary, he will hope to continue a winning run that includes, if you so wish, challenge game victories over Limerick and Clare.
It’s a hectic programme but like his college team-mate Mark Rodgers he is embracing it.
“I think it’s great – I don’t have to do any training on Tuesday night so I’m missing out on all the running,” he smiles.
“Like any player, you just want to be playing matches and to be fair to the lads they are very accommodating, both sets of management are very good with linking over. I’m just happy to be playing these matches and the more, the better.”
O’Connor thrust himself into the limelight with a fine goal against Cork in last year’s Munster SHC where he was also tasked with taking frees following Jason Forde’s injury midway through the first half.
The 24-year-old fired over nine frees in the following draw with Limerick – he had just been taken off prior to John McGrath sending over the equalising placed ball in injury-time – before his season petered out after the Waterford defeat with substitute appearances against Offaly and Galway.
Losing to Henry Shefflin’s side in last year’s All-Ireland quarter-final was on his mind when Tipperary were faced with them again.
“We haven’t forgotten about last June when Galway knocked us out of the championship.
“To be fair, they came very strong there in the second half. They could have clipped six or seven points on the go but we were lucky that we tailed it back there and there was a bit of emotion when we were two or three up.”
As Liam Cahill said following Sunday’s game, O’Connor’s undivided attention will now be given to UL as they look to retain the Fitzgibbon Cup starting with tomorrow evening’s semi-final against University of Galway.
Nevertheless, the Moyne-Templetuohy man will be looking for Tipperary to address a lack of clinical finishing in the Galway game when he returns to training later in the month.
“In a way, we were disappointed that we didn’t convert them but we were still very happy that we were making the goal chances. Just a few lads were unlucky with the way ball broke.
“I suppose we did let Galway into the game a bit in the second half. We managed to claw it back in the end. We could have been a good bit ahead by half-time, we did leave a lot of chances behind us but we’ve plenty to work on over the next few weeks.”
