Former Hurler of the Year Tony Keady is in a serious condition at Galway University after suffering a suspected heart attack.

The 53-year-old was in Croke Park on Sunday to watch the Tribesmen overcome Tipperary in a titanic battle and is now facing one of his own.

He was taken ill in the early hours of Tuesday morning.

Keady landed the Hurler of the Year award in 1988, the last time Galway won and All-Ireland, and was also pivotal to their success in 1987.

He was controversially banned from taking part in the 1989 semi-final defeat to Tipperary for playing in the United States.

Keady is one of only three Galway players to win the Hurler of the Year Award (Joe Connolly in 1980 and Joe Cooney in '87 are the others).

The Killimordaly clubman is widely regarded as one of the best centre backs to play the game.

He lives with his his wife Margaret and their four young children live in Frenchfort in Oranmore where the former hurler works as the caretaker in Calansanctius College.

Messages of support and solidarity have been pouring in on social media.

Thoughts are with Tony Keady and family - hopefully he will pull through with t best of care and recover well - — Tomas Mulcahy (@tomas_mulcahy) August 8, 2017

Best wishes to Tony Keady for a speedy recovery to full health. — Joe Dooley (@DooleyJoe) August 8, 2017

Subscribe to The Throw-In, Independent.ie's weekly Championship podcast, for the best in GAA discussion and analysis every Monday, with some of the biggest names in football and hurling from Joe Brolly, Tomás Ó'Sé, Brendan Cummins and John Mullane.

Subscribe and listen to The Throw-In podcast on iTunes or SoundCloud.

Online Editors