{"id":627176,"date":"2026-09-17T05:12:11","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T05:12:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/627176\/"},"modified":"2026-09-17T05:12:11","modified_gmt":"2026-09-17T05:12:11","slug":"im-playing-the-last-couple-of-games-of-my-career","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/627176\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8216;I&#8217;m playing the last couple of games of my career&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>                    <img src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/b23eedf8-20f2-47c0-8414-446210ed3441.jpg\" alt=\"'I'm playing the last couple of games of my career'\" width=\"1200\" height=\"675\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Clare&#8217;s Shane O&#8217;Donnell and Daithi Lohan dejected after the deefat to Limerick \u00a9INPHO\/Ryan Byrne<\/p>\n<p>Shane O\u2019Donnell is set\u00a0to hang up his hurl at the end of the season.<\/p>\n<p>The double All-Ireland winner and the 2024 Hurler of the Year retired from inter-county duty after Clare\u2019s All-Ireland SHC semi-final loss to Limerick in July and is now set to leave the club stage as well, despite being only 32. He recently got engaged to\u00a0Niamh Willis and the couple are planning on emigrating to Australia later this year.<\/p>\n<p>O\u2019Donnell confirmed to TG4 after helping holders \u00c9ire \u00d3g Ennis to a 3-25 to 1-14 Clare SHC quarter-final victory over Wolfe Tones Shannon last Sunday this season would be his last.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cToday could have been the last game, and I was pretty conscious of that coming in, to just enjoy and embrace it. So I\u2019m playing the last couple of games of my career and trying to embrace and enjoy them,\u201d the gifted forward said.<\/p>\n<p>O\u2019Donnell admitted that the role of spectator will take a bit of getting used to.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019ll have a better answer for you next year, but this part of the year is the same, you go straight back to the club. But the thought that I won\u2019t be going back training next year, it\u2019s strange knowing I\u2019ll be outside that group watching on.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBut another phase of life that I\u2019m looking forward to, so there\u2019s good parts as well,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>                Share<\/p>\n<p>                     Share<\/p>\n<p>                <a class=\"btn hs-btn-default\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer\/sharer.php?u=https:\/\/www.hoganstand.com\/Article\/Index\/341795\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" target=\"_blank\">Facebook<\/a><br \/>\n                <a class=\"btn hs-btn-default\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?url=https:\/\/www.hoganstand.com\/Article\/Index\/341795\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" target=\"_blank\">X \/ Twitter<\/a><\/p>\n<p>            <script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Clare&#8217;s Shane O&#8217;Donnell and Daithi Lohan dejected after the deefat to Limerick \u00a9INPHO\/Ryan Byrne Shane O\u2019Donnell is set\u00a0to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":627177,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[61,60,112],"class_list":["post-627176","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/627176","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=627176"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/627176\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/627177"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=627176"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=627176"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=627176"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}