Conor McDonald reflects on a crazy weekend of hurling & getting dropped for first time in ten years

Conor McDonald made his first Championship start for Wexford in 2014, in the Leinster championship against Antrim. Just a teenager at the time, the Gorey sharpshooter showed his class that day by scoring 2-2 from play. If nothing else, a debut like that burdened McDonald with the weight of expectation thereafter but he was unfazed, going on to play a key role in Wexford's march to that year's All-Ireland quarter finals. McDonald scored a further pivotal goal against Clare in that brilliant debut season and from there, he became a permanent fixture on the Wexford team. From then to now, sure as the sky is blue, he's been their ball-winning dynamo on the edge of the square. Until suddenly, he wasn't. The season just gone was a strange one for Wexford, ending on the high note of a relegation-saving win over bitter rivals Kilkenny. A relegation saving win - nothing captures the strangeness of it all like quite that statement. But perhaps strangest of all was seeing Wexford start a championship game without McDonald on the team. They did against Dublin this year and, speaking on The GAA Hour Show on Monday, McDonald explained how he took the news.