Hurling fever ahead of the county’s first All-Ireland Final appearance in seven years proved too much for one Galway dog who has been forced to move to a new home for a few days in order to escape ticket-hunting fans.

Joe is the family pet of Hurling Board Secretary Pat Kearney, whose home in Oranmore has been besieged by anxious fans from early morning until late at night as the search for elusive tickets for Croke Park intensifies.

“Joe became extremely upset when people started calling from seven o’clock in the morning until eleven at night and we’ve had to move him to another home until after the final,” said Mr Kearney on Wednesday.

Mr Kearney was anxious to explain to visitors and telephone callers that he did not have any tickets for sale at his home, with the vast majority of Galway’s allocation of just over 12,000 being distributed through the county’s 95 GAA clubs.

The county did receive some ‘returns’ from throughout the country on Tuesday, but he said that all of these extra tickets – an average of eight stand and nine terrace per club – were being distributed through hurling clubs.

“We are hoping that people who have not been successful and are disappointed would understand that we believe this is the fairest way of distributing the tickets and ensuring they get to the people who genuinely deserve them,” said Mr Kearney.

Staff at the GAA office in Pearse Stadium have been swamped by personal callers over the past two weeks as they struggle to cope with the demand.

Mr Kearney said staff resources were “very slim” and the Hurling Board had to get on with planning normal local GAA events such as a number of minor quarter-finals this Friday evening.

See full story in this week's Connacht Tribune - along with our free 32 page All-Ireland Final supplement.