Relentless E-Book

Mary White

• Herausgeber: Mercier Press
• Kategorie: Lebensstil
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019

Seitenzahl: 413

Beschreibung

Relentless tells the story of the rise of Cork ladies football between 2005 and 2016. Having never won a senior title in the sport in 2004, by 2016 the team had won ten All-Ireland titles in eleven years. Mary White takes the reader behind the scenes and shows what made the Cork ladies footballers one of the most successful teams ever in the history of Irish sport. The book was shortlisted for the 2015 Setanta Ireland Sports Book of the Year. This edition contains a new afterword from the author, bringing the story up to the present day. 'It would have been disastrous if the best team in Irish sport had passed into history without their story being told. Luckily for them and for us, Mary White was there taking notes right from the beginning and can give an outsider's view with an insider's knowledge. It's not often that happens. A great insight into a truly great team.' – Malachy Clerkin, The Irish Times

Leseprobe

MERCIER PRESS

3B Oak House, Bessboro Rd

Blackrock, Cork, Ireland.

www.mercierpress.ie

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First published in 2015 by Currach Press. Revised edition first published 2019.

© Mary White, 2019

Foreword © Brian Cody, 2019

Epub ISBN: 978 1 78117 706 8

This eBook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

Inhalt

Foreword

The Characters

Prologue Small Heads and Small Arses

1 The Famous Five, And a Kerryman

2 Hating on Each Other

3 There´s Something about Mary

4 Mastermind

5 The Munster Mash

6 Peas & Carrots

7 The Embrace

8 Sand, Sweat and Sunburn

9 The Stars Align

10 Dude, Where´s my Hotel?

11 Life, Death and Gratitude

12 The Unsung Hero

13 Annus Horribilis

14 Turning on the Light

15 For Donie

16 The Intervention

17 Under Siege

18 A Change of Guard

19 The Comeback

20 Basics and Baby Bumps

21 The Perfect Ten

22 Rival Respect and Legacies

Afterword

Appendices

Acknowledgements

About the Author

In memory of Bridget O’Brien,Cork Ladies Team Liaison Officer, 2011–17

Foreword

Brian Cody

It is a privilege for me to be asked to write this foreword and it is fitting that the title of this book is Relentless because that is exactly what this group of people have been since 2004 in their pursuit of excellence.

Theirs has been an amazing journey considering that prior to 2004 they had never won a senior Munster or All-Ireland title. Since then, they have won an incredible eleven All-Irelands, five in a row from 2005 to 2009, losing out in 2010, only to regroup and win six in a row between 2011 and 2016.

The great thing about this run, for me, is that so many of these championships were won after titanic battles. Looking back on the scores in the finals, I discovered that five of the finals were won by just one point and another won by two points. This just shows how competitive the championships have been and speaks volumes for the consistency and never-say-die attitude of everyone concerned.

It’s very obvious from this book that the fundamentals required for success with any group are truly embedded. This kind of success could not be achieved without an absolutely unbreakable spirit. Certainly, the sense of spirit within the group jumps off the pages.

As in all teams, individuals come and go, but there have been some constants in the Cork ladies set-up since 2004. Remarkably, ten players played in every final from 2005 to 2013, while four of those played every minute of every final – a truly phenomenal achievement by these players.

The other constant, from 2004–2015, was their coach/manager, Eamonn Ryan. Eamonn was appointed in 2004 and was the mastermind behind all their successes up to 2016. The book provides many insights into Eamonn’s philosophies and core values. What is particularly interesting is the way he continually developed and evolved as coach, constantly looking for new ideas and challenging himself to become better.

His humility contributed in a major way to a dressing room devoid of ego. We see the uncomplicated style of Eamonn’s coaching and how quickly the players bought into his methods. The pursuit of excellence is always at the core of how they train and certainly anybody involved in coaching has much to learn from this book.

In December 2014, this Cork team was voted by the public as the RTÉ Sports Team of the Year. This award was in recognition of their victory in the All-Ireland final against an excellent Dublin team. With sixteen minutes to go in the final, Dublin led by ten points, but thanks to the unbreakable spirit within the Cork players and the inspirational leadership of Eamonn, they fought back to win the game by a point. Relentless indeed!

This award was fitting recognition of what has been achieved by an outstanding team.

On a personal level, I have admired the achievements of the Cork ladies footballers and this particular team for a number of years. I have met Eamonn and some of the players at various functions over the past decade and have always enjoyed their company.

Theirs is a wonderful story.

Finally, I congratulate Mary on bringing this story of excellence in sport to print, and I am sure people everywhere will find it both interesting and inspiring.

The Characters

Eamonn Ryan (Coach): The mastermind behind Cork’s rise from ruins to glory.

Ephie Fitzgerald (Coach): The man who replaced Eamonn Ryan in 2016. Fitzgerald won a Munster SFC medal with Cork and is a three-time All-Ireland medallist with Nemo Rangers.

The Players: See appendices for the names of the ninety-plus players who played under Eamonn Ryan from 2004–2015.

Frankie Honohan (Selector): The unsung hero and longest-serving member on the management team.

Mary Collins (Manager): The straight-talking instigator who dissolved the club rivalries and brought together the best players in the county for Ryan to mould.

Charlie McLaughlin (Ryan’s predecessor): The coach who was unable to bring success at senior level after seven years at the helm, but who transformed underage football in Cork.

Juliet Murphy (Captain, 2004–2007): The first captain under Eamonn Ryan, whose high standards set the tone for Cork’s work rate and formed a winning culture.

Captains: Juliet Murphy (2004–2007), Angela Walsh (2008), Mary O’Connor (2009), Rena Buckley (2010 and 2012), Amy O’Shea (2011), Anne-Marie Walsh (2013), Briege Corkery (2014), Ciara O’Sullivan (2015–2018).

Primary Dual Stars: Briege Corkery, Rena Buckley, Mary O’Connor and Angela Walsh.

Eamonn Ryan’s Back-Room staff (2004–2015):

Selectors: Ger Twomey, Timmy O’Callaghan, Jim McEvoy, Noel O’Connor, Justin McCarthy, James O’Callaghan, Pat O’Leary and Shane Ronayne.

Statisticians: Tim Murphy and Don Ryan.

Liaison Officers: Eileen O’Brien-Collins and Bridget O’Brien.

Goalkeeping Coach: Kieran Dwyer.

Chauffeur: Cormac O’Connor of O’Connor Coaches.

Other: Brian O’Connell, Michael Cotter, Dr Lucy Fleming, Gráinne Desmond, Eleanor Lucey, Declan O’Sullivan, Denise Walsh, Emma O’Donovan, Sinéad Lynch, Colette Trout, Carol O’Mahony (physios, masseurs, doctors), Peter O’Leary and Pat Lucey (cameraman).

Prologue

Small Heads and Small Arses

‘The measure of who we are, is what we do with what we have.’ Vince Lombardi

RTÉ Sports Awards, 21 December 2014

Donnybrook, Dublin

In a hotel room in Dublin, Geraldine O’Flynn and Nollaig Cleary each sip on a glass of wine as their captain, Briege Corkery, readies herself for a live television interview later that evening with RTÉ’s Darragh Maloney.

Angela Walsh sits on the end of the bed, but the Ladies Gaelic Football Association (LGFA) 2014 Players’ Player of the Year nominee isn’t drinking. She’s three months pregnant with her first child, Keeva, and a few weeks earlier informed coach Eamonn Ryan that she wouldn’t be available for the 2015 league campaign.

‘I’m expecting in June, Eamonn,’ she told him in a quiet corner of the Castlemartyr Golf Resort clubhouse at the team’s holiday fundraiser.

‘Ah congrats Angie … you’ll be back for championship so!’ he joked, before advising Walsh, as he would one of his own, to mind herself.

Courtesy taxis take them to the RTÉ Sports Awards, where Ryan is nominated for Manager of the Year and they for Team of the Year following an incredible ten-point comeback against Dublin in the 2014 All-Ireland final. The other nominees are the Irish men’s rugby team for winning the Six Nations, the SSE Airtricity League champions Dundalk FC, and the All-Ireland-winning Kerry football, Kilkenny hurling and Cork camogie teams.

As they make their way to the pre-show drinks recep­tion, O’Flynn, Cleary, Walsh and Corkery unanimously agree that the rugby team will win the public vote hands down. They’ve been here before, and although nominated again having won their ninth All-Ireland title in ten years, expectations of winning the award are zero. Instead, they turn their focus to getting a photograph with world number one golfer Rory McIlroy, who’s there to collect the Sports Personality of the Year award, having won the 2014 Open and US PGA championships.

Other sports stars, including Irish soccer manager Martin O’Neill, IBF super bantamweight champion Carl Frampton and Ryder Cup captain Paul McGinley, flutter about, but all eyes are on how McIlroy carries himself in his stylish grey plaid suit.

Taking to their seats, Corkery, Cleary, O’Flynn and Walsh are in prime position in the front row. McIlroy is just inches away, and the countdown begins.

‘Three, two, one, and we’re live …’ the production mana­ger announces, pointing to presenter Darragh Maloney to take it away.

Video clips flash on the screen behind him of various guests, and when the Cork footballers appear lifting the Brendan Martin Cup, the players holler and hoot. McIlroy turns and gives them a cheeky smile.

An emotional former Irish rugby captain, Brian O’Driscoll, is inducted into the RTÉ Sport Hall of Fame following a surprise announcement, and his parents, Frank and Geraldine, present him with his award. Afterwards, it’s Eamonn Ryan’s turn to be interviewed by Maloney and he’s asked how the Rebels have won yet another All-Ireland.

‘How have we been able to keep going?’ Ryan repeats the question. ‘We just have … and with the least amount of resources too,’ he replies deadpan.

The crowd chuckle at Ryan’s diplomatic jibe, of which any quick-witted Corkman would be proud. But the Mana­ger of the Year award goes to the rugby coach Joe Schmidt for winning the Six Nations. As the New Zealander is interviewed, a production assistant taps Nollaig Cleary on the shoulder.

‘Nollaig,’ he whispers, ‘ye’ve won the Team of the Year award, and you’re to speak to Darragh.’

‘Sorry?’

‘You’re to speak to Darragh when ye collect the award.’

‘We won?’ a puzzled Cleary asks.

‘Yes. And you’re to do the talking.’

‘Ah, no, no, no … sure Briege is the captain,’ Cleary replies, flustered, not knowing whether to believe what she’s just been told.

‘No, you’re to speak to him.’

‘Ah, no, no, no … sure Eamonn’s the coach, ye have to speak to him.’

‘We’ve spoken to him already!’ he snaps, agitated by Cleary’s objections, before vanishing back into the darkness.

Immediately, O’Flynn, Corkery and Walsh turn in Cleary’s direction and quiz her. A shush! comes from behind them as they try to make sense of what’s just happened.

‘Are you sure that’s what he said?’ O’Flynn asks.

‘He probably said if we win, Nol,’ says Walsh.

‘No, he said we won! I’m nearly sure of it,’ Cleary insists frantically, now beginning to doubt herself.

Rory McIlroy turns around to see what the commotion is about. In unison, they smile at him.

The production assistant reappears, and the presumption is that it’s to apologise, that in fact the Irish rugby team have won the award.

He taps Cleary on the shoulder again, leaning a little closer to her ear this time round. ‘Oh, and by the way, act surprised!’

They don’t need to act. They’ve finally been welcomed to the top table of Irish sport thanks to diehard sports fans, and it isn’t out of sympathy, or anything else. The masses have finally recognised their achievements over the last decade, and every minute’s been worth it for this moment alone.

27 per cent of the vote is for the Cork ladies footballers – 11 per cent more than the Irish rugby team.

In some ways the public vote means more than any of their nine All-Ireland wins, the most dramatic of which had come three months earlier, when, ten points down against Dublin with sixteen minutes left, they played out the best comeback ever witnessed in Croke Park – a point by O’Flynn in the dying embers to win it 2–13 to 2–12.

The manner of that comeback solidified their greatness, and the fact that they’re now the first female outfit to ever win the RTÉ Sports Team of the Year means so much.

As they make their way onto the stage, it’s the happiest they’ve seen Eamonn Ryan. The man, the coach they’ve come to love. At seventy-three, he’s fifty-six years older than the youngest squad recruit, but receiving tonight’s award knocks four decades off him.

They veer backstage, out of sight, and begin their private celebrations. Hugging and jumping as one.

Sitting in the audience, Nollaig Cleary’s husband, former Cork footballer Micheál Ó Crónín, can hear them celebrate behind the backdrop. He smiles to himself, knowing just how much this means to them.

•••

I had the privilege of following Cork’s journey since Ryan’s first training session in January 2004, first as a player on the fringes, then as a sports journalist. I have been both an insider and an outsider, which has allowed me to pen these pages and tell the story of one of the greatest GAA teams of all time. It is probable that we will never see the likes of them again.

Prior to Eamonn Ryan’s involvement in 2004, Cork had never won a Munster senior championship title in the competition’s thirty-year history, never mind a senior All-Ireland. After eleven years with Ryan at the helm, Cork accrued the Brendan Martin Cup ten times, nine division one national league titles and ten Munster championship titles. In 2016, under Ephie Fitzgerald, they added another All-Ireland.

But what many don’t realise is the relentless journey Cork have been on to maintain their high standards. From suffering numerous hammerings at the hands of Kerry and Waterford in the eighties and nineties, a new culture created by Ryan helped Cork morph into a ladies football superpower. For more than a decade, they dominated the sport, winning twenty-nine titles out of a possible thirty-six come the end of 2015.

A total of ninety-one players would ply their trade under Ryan at one point or another, with forty-three having departed since 2005, all of whom have at least one All-Ireland medal.

Incredibly, since winning their first All-Ireland in 2005, come September 2015 they had lost just one championship game in the All-Ireland series – the 2010 quarter-final to Tyrone.

Leaving the pitch that day in Banagher, Co. Offaly, they were devastated, and for weeks after were unable to find it in themselves to make contact with one another. They weren’t avoiding each other because of the defeat, but because they were ashamed about how they had let themselves, and Ryan, down in the months prior to the game.

In 2010 complacency had set in. Cork could have taken the easy option and laid the blame elsewhere, but instead they looked within. Those few weeks spent away from each other after the defeat to Tyrone was time spent soul-searching. The door was always open, to come or go, and Ryan would often say that being part of the team was ‘a choice, not a sacrifice’. But that loss to Tyrone bruised their pride. They fell short of their own benchmark. That is what hurt the most, because it was they who had raised the bar for everyone else.

Their lack of ego aside, Cork are defined by the honest, diligent brand of football they play, which Ryan has humorously put down to them having ‘small heads and small arses’. They’re known, too, for an unparalleled ability to stare down adversity and come back from the edge of losing. From losing it all even.

What goes hand in hand with all they have done is how they have done it. They’ve grown up together, bonded together and been moulded by a father-like figure, who expected nothing but modesty in return throughout the entire process, his own mannerisms paving the way.

Ryan would say things like ‘Appreciate what you have before time teaches you to appreciate what you had’ or ‘Attitude before aptitude, will get you to altitude’. Those things have forever stayed in his players’ psyche.

But, most of all, from the first time they met Eamonn Ryan they were resolute in everything they did. Be that giving it their all on the field of play or in a simple drill; working as a unit; respecting Ryan and his selectors; coming back from eight, nine, even ten points down to win at the death; making their families and partners proud; raising the profile of the game; being gracious in victory, and defeat; being the best they can be.

Relentless: this is their story.

1

The Famous Five, And a Kerryman

‘Doubt is only removed by action.’Conor McGregor

Goalkeeper Elaine Harte has solid hands, but tonight they’re shaking. So too are her legs.

Sitting on a rickety bar stool in the back lounge of Murray’s Bar in Macroom for the 2003 county board AGM, she’s waited nearly two hours to hear who’s been selected to oversee the county management teams for the following season. Aged just twenty-two, she’s the only senior inter-county player present.

It’s a poky old function room with faded upholstery, and from behind the empty bar a grumbling old ice machine interjects every now and then during the meeting.

Club delegates are crammed in, knowing sparks may very well fly over the course of the next few hours. For the first time in seven years, the senior manager’s job is up for discussion, and strong personalities should add some drama on what would otherwise be a boring December night.

Charlie McLaughlin is the man who’s been in charge of the Cork senior ladies football team since 1996, but not one piece of provincial silverware has been won in his seven-year reign. That, a few weeks previously, three Cork clubs – Donoughmore, Naomh Abán and Gabriel Rangers – won the senior, intermediate and junior All-Ireland club titles isn’t helping McLaughlin’s cause either. What is in his favour is the fact that the underage county teams he’s involved in have been going well. Senior success, however, is what the mob is baying for.

It’s a number of months since McLaughlin oversaw Cork’s one-point loss to Kerry in the 2003 Munster senior championship semi-final, and the board made him aware in advance of tonight’s meeting that a task group of five club delegates had been appointed to put in place the 2004 senior and junior county management teams. This is no coup.

Stephen Mullane of Liscarroll, John Thompson of Naomh Abán, Liz Ahern of Carrigtwohill, Ger Walsh of Donoughmore and Rockbán’s Marie Mulcahy, mother of promising young player Valerie, have been tipping away in the background in the lead-up to tonight’s meeting, searching for the reasons as to why the Cork senior team isn’t progressing despite all the county’s club success.

•••

Mulcahy signed up for the committee in a heartbeat.

‘I was sick of it. We all knew the potential was there, if there was any bit of organisation. It was time to do something. We were tired of being hammered by the likes of Kerry and Waterford. The players weren’t turning up to training, and what could you do with the four or five that did? How could you even win a match with that kind of carry on?’

Mulcahy established Rockbán LFC and was its secretary for ten years. Her eldest daughter, Valerie, had won two All-Ireland club medals at the turn of the millennium, and she knew that Cork had it in them if they got their act together.

The task group met once a week in the Commons Inn in Blackpool on the outskirts of Cork city. They were aware of the difficulty of the job, but something had to give. They knew what McLaughlin had achieved in his roles with the underage, but most senior club players in the county weren’t willing to wear the jersey for him.

They approached Mossie Barrett, who, just weeks earlier, had coached Donoughmore to a second senior All-Ireland club title. Barrett wanted his own selectors, but the committee couldn’t agree with that stipulation. Cork dual star Fiona O’Driscoll was also approached, but having recently retired, it was too soon for her to take up an inter-county coaching role.

A few others were in the mix, but as the committee delved further they realised the need to put in place someone who had no connections to Cork ladies football. Someone with no baggage and no agenda. It narrowed the pool of candidates considerably, and as the weeks drew closer to the AGM, their mettle was tested.

Committee member Liz Ahern confided in a friend at work in University College Cork about the group’s dilemma. Maurice McNamara listened closely as Ahern queried the possibility of former Cork GAA stars such as Jimmy Barry Murphy and Larry Tompkins getting involved. McNamara was a shrewd Kerryman and a serious sports fan, with strong ties to the GAA teams in the university.

‘I’ve someone in mind,’ he told Ahern within minutes of the conversation commencing, ‘but I can’t tell you until I talk to him first.’

The following day, McNamara returned with a sheet of A4 paper, upon which sat a modest, five-line coaching biography. It read:

Eamonn Ryan (GAA Development Officer, UCC)

Trained Cork minors through the nineties

Selector for the Cork senior men’s football panel for the last four years

Coached UCC seniors

Retired headmaster

Has all coaching badges

Ahern was delighted with McNamara’s proposal and the committee wasted no time in trying to meet with Ryan. It was now a week or so before the 2003 Cork ladies football board AGM, and Ryan agreed to at least hear them out at a meeting in the Powder Mills in Ballincollig.

He knew Charlie McLaughlin well, having worked with him on management teams before, and he was aware that the Donegal man was at the helm for Cork’s last senior championship match a few months earlier. He listened, but under no circumstances would Ryan take the job with another manager in situ, despite the fact that McLaughlin had yet to be reappointed by the club delegates. Instead, Ryan thanked the committee for their time and they headed their separate ways.

They were at a loss about what to do. With no names on the shortlist, all the task group could do was compose a statement with their recommendations to read out at the AGM.

•••

In Murray’s Bar, committee member Liz Ahern takes to the floor to explain their findings. As the youngest member, AGMs and board meetings are relatively new territory, but Ahern’s got bottle. She stands, and begins to read:

This committee was set up with the stated objective of nominating a management structure for the Cork senior and junior teams.

At our first meeting, the decision was taken to have discussions with a number of people nominated for the various positions, i.e. coach, selectors, liaison officers, etc. It became obvious in quite a short time that there was a large degree of dissatisfaction with the current structures and personalities involved. In fact, the more people we spoke with, the more this impression was compounded.

A number of former officials stated that they would be more than willing to give their services to Cork ladies football but would not allow their names to go forward if the current management team was to remain in place for yet another year.

This has placed the committee in a very invidious position, i.e. we believe that we can put an excellent management team in place but there is no possibility that this can happen at this time. We regret to have to report that it is our unanimous feeling that most, if not all, of these problems stem from the current senior management.

After seven years, the state of our senior county ladies team is deplorable despite Cork clubs winning numerous All-Ireland club titles at junior, intermediate and senior level.

The senior Cork team’s record is: All-Ireland championships: nil. Munster titles: nil. Despite having teams (Naomh Abán, Gabriel Rangers and Donoughmore) playing in all three All-Ireland finals, we contested no Munster final this year at either junior or senior level at county.

We feel that the time has come for change. We would appeal to the current management team to step aside for the sake of ladies football and allow us to nominate a new management structure which would be free of the politics and dissension that has become a feature of the current structure.

We feel that it is incumbent on us to put football first and to put our own petty differences to the side.

The unanimous decision of the committee is that we would like to be allowed to finish the job that we were elected to do and, to enable us to do so, we would ask the delegates at this AGM to encourage the senior management team to resign and not seek re-election.

There’s an intake of breath as Ahern folds over the page and sits down. Delegates shuffle in their seats and mumble at the enormity of what’s just been asked of them. Is this really happening? Is the man who has dominated Cork football at every level for more or less seven years being asked to step aside as manager of the Cork senior team?

A vote is taken on the committee’s recommendation. Club representatives know it’s time for a change, and the result is primarily in favour of the senior management team stepping down. The delegates have spoken. But McLaughlin refuses to step aside.

•••

Charlie McLaughlin was born in the small village of Creeslough in Donegal. From a family of seven, it didn’t take him long to learn how to fight his corner, becoming a feisty centre-back, and lining out for Donegal at minor, U21 and senior level.

In 1969, as the Troubles kicked off in Northern Ireland, he left home aged sixteen. As a child, the political and religious unrest was never something explained to him, but instinctively he knew there was a divide. Years later, that divide would affect his family first-hand when his sister was badly injured in the Dublin and Monaghan Bombings on 17 May 1974, in which a series of co-ordinated car bombings took place in both the capital and in Co. Monaghan. Three bombs exploded in Dublin city centre during rush-hour traffic, and a fourth exploded in Monaghan ninety minutes later. A total of thirty-three civilians, aged from five months to eighty years, were killed between all the bombings, and three hundred, including McLaughlin’s sister, were injured in what was the deadliest terrorist attack in the Republic’s history.

At 5.32 p.m., while walking home from school on South Leinster Street near the railings of Trinity College, not far from Leinster House, a bomb hidden in a blue Austin 1800 Maxi – which was hijacked earlier that morning from a taxi company in Belfast – exploded. Despite being blown across two lanes of traffic and through a glass window, McLaughlin’s sister survived.

Those difficult days made him the resilient man he is, and he quickly learned that life was too short to mince your words. Some folks don’t like that about him, but it’s never bothered him.

He sought adventure first in Dublin, where he lined out with the Crumlin-based St Enda’s team for three years. Soon after, he made his mark in the senior domestic championship and was asked onto the Dublin inter-county panel, but being a proud Donegal man, McLaughlin declined. Emigration had been playing on his mind, and the plan was to move to America, but in 1975 he found himself playing football with Nemo Rangers in Cork, and four decades on he’s still floating around the clubhouse in Trabeg.

A plasterer by trade, McLaughlin went on to win a Munster club championship with Nemo, but injury cut his career short. First he broke his collarbone, then his leg in a challenge match, before damaging his cruciate. He would never play again after that, but he’d do the next best thing and coach.

In 1996, the chairwoman of the Cork ladies football board, Ester Cahill, had heard of a football-mad Donegal fella who was coaching day and night across Cork, including the Ballygarvan and Cill na Martra junior football teams, Valley Rovers’ intermediate footballers and the University College Cork (UCC) Sigerson team, while also being the masseur for the Cork senior and U21 footballers.

He must be good, Cahill decided and phoned Mc­Laughlin to ask if he would coach the Cork senior ladies football team.

‘I laughed at first to be honest, and then I said no,’ McLaughlin remembers. ‘But she pleaded with me to take just one session and show the girls what to do. It was on a pitch out on the Lee Road and there was about seven of them standing on the field waiting for me. They didn’t have much talent, but they had a lot of heart, and that’ll win out every time.’

Under the persuasive powers of Cahill, McLaughlin was reeled in with the offer of £30 a session. Three times a week, £90 was hardly worth his while, but he accepted.

Two years later, and with as much skill now as heart, Cork won the 1998 intermediate All-Ireland final against Laois, with McLaughlin and Pat O’Sullivan on the line. It was an emotional day. It was the first piece of silverware seventeen-year-old Karen Con O’Sullivan had won since her mother’s tragic passing the year before.

On 18 May 1997, her mother, Joan, was driving Karen from their home in Castletownbere on the tiptoe of Ireland to Cork minor training in Donoughmore. It was a six-hour round trip for young Karen and her teammates, Susan Power and Emma Holland, but just minutes from arriving at the pitch, they were involved in an accident at Crean’s Cross – one hundred yards from future Cork captain Juliet Murphy’s house.

Sadly, Karen’s mother was killed. A year later, however, O’Sullivan and Power both lined out at wing-forward, winning the All-Ireland intermediate football final in Duggan Park, Ballinasloe.

In 1999, McLaughlin was at the helm again when Cork won the division three league final against Kildare in Boherlahan, Tipperary. A few weeks later, he would oversee the first Cork victory over Kerry in the Munster senior championship, defeating the eleven-time All-Ireland champions in the provincial semi-final in Fitzgerald Stadium by a point. But it was a freak win. In the final in Dungarvan, Waterford drilled them by sixteen points, 6–12 to 2–8.

McLaughlin, though, was seeing progress. The previous year, Waterford had beaten them by twenty-four points. His vision now was to create a Cork Ladies Football School of Excellence and so he took up a development officer role with the county board and set about making the dream a reality with the help of Fr Liam Kelleher, Mary Power, Ted O’Donovan, Christy O’Sullivan and Sheila Quinlan.

At the very first session, ninety-eight girls turned up to the sports hall at Coláiste an Chroí Naofa boarding school in Carrignavar, and for the likes of future senior stars Rena Buckley, Geraldine O’Flynn and Bríd Stack, it was to be their university of football.

McLaughlin’s School of Excellence would produce a conveyor belt of stars and underage All-Ireland and Munster titles for Cork. But with the underage set-up beginning to dominate priorities, the senior players began to have serious doubts about their importance, and the importance of the quest to win the county’s first senior All-Ireland title.

•••

Elaine Harte rises from her rickety bar stool, her legs like jelly. She isn’t one for putting her head above the parapet, but she knows this is what it’ll take because there’s no other senior player in the room to do the talking. She’s only attending the meeting as a club delegate, but she knows she cannot hide.

Harte was the first girl to play on the boys’ football team at Upper Glanmire NS. She played in goal for Ireland in soccer at underage level on an international stage, and won two All-Ireland club medals with Rockbán LFC – one in goal and one at full-forward. Taking her game to the next level is something she strives for. But that growth as a player has been stunted with Cork for the past number of years, and she’s frustrated.

Softly spoken, Harte wasn’t raised to make noise for the sake of it. She was raised to stand up for what she believed in, and the time is right.

‘Look, I’m not here to speak on behalf of the players,’ she begins. ‘But what I can say is that we totally respect what Charlie has done with the underage teams and all the success he’s brought them, but, after seven years at senior level, it’s time for a change.’

All eyes are on McLaughlin, gauging what his reaction will be.

‘How can you give out about things when you’re one of the players who won’t even come training?’ he bellows towards the back of the room, his finger pointing with rage at Harte.

‘Hang on a second, Charlie,’ she replies, her voice shaking from the unexpected response. ‘You knew I was working evenings and that I wouldn’t be able to make some sessions. You’d arranged for different sessions with me and some of the backs, and that was the deal. I’d explained my work situation to you and that was the agreement we’d made.’

Someone in Harte’s vicinity comes to her defence by saying McLaughlin has just made this personal, and Harte’s eyes begin to fill up. ‘Well, all I’ll say is, if you’re there next year, Charlie, I certainly won’t be.’

It’s all kicked off as predicted and the tension is excruciating.

The chairman calls order as everyone grapples with what’s just happened. It’s nearing midnight and the meeting is entering its fifth hour. The delegates are reminded of the recommendation: that the present senior management set-up move aside for the good of Cork football. McLaughlin reiterates that he’s not bowing to the committee’s recommendation and instead announces that he’s putting himself forward again for the position of manager.

The five tasked with finding the new manager look at each other. They didn’t expect that card to be played, and now they’re caught in limbo, with no name to counteract McLaughlin’s.

As it transpires, the committee members are sitting at the back of the room next to the Cork junior ladies football manager, Mary Collins, who arrived late to the meeting having been held up at a funeral in Millstreet. The previous year, Collins oversaw the juniors’ first Munster final win in seven years and the chairman of the task group, Stephen Mullane, knows how sharp she is.

‘Mary, you’ll go up against him?’ pleads Mullane.

It’s the first Collins hears of it, and she’s no more ready for what’s being asked of her, but the seconds are ticking.

Desperation is spilling out of Mullane’s eyes and Collins knows that the right thing to do is to say yes. Nothing will change otherwise and so Collins raises her arm.

‘Through the chair, I’d like to put myself forward for the job too,’ she spouts.

Not for the first time that night, things take an un­expected turn. Collins’ proposal means a second vote must be taken. It’s her versus McLaughlin, and pieces of paper are being frantically cut and distributed around the room.

The votes are collected and Collins lands herself the top job in the county at approximately 1.30 a.m. – six hours after the meeting commenced.

For McLaughlin, it’s a kick in the gut.

‘I felt rotten. Betrayed even. At the time, Cork ladies football was only going in one direction, and that was up. If we kept doing the same thing all the time, only changing the drills as the players came up along to suit the physical aspects of the game, then we’d have got there at senior level.

‘But, looking back, my communication with the older players was part of the problem. I know that now, but the thing was that the county board never looked at where we were coming from, only where we were going. You can put a very good roof on a house, but you’d be nowhere without a good foundation underneath it.’

But the players were part of the problem too.

2

Hating on Each Other

‘Our morale was a damp patch somewhere on the soles of our boots … we could either walk away, or we could do something.’Donal Óg Cusack on the 2002 Cork hurling strike

Here’s how it was in Cork ladies football:

2001

In 2001, things began to unravel for McLaughlin. He’d done well to take Cork to the 1998 and 2000 intermediate All-Ireland finals, and the 1999 division three league final, but in this, his fifth year, the players were finding the approach stagnant.

There was no central training base, but the majority of sessions took place in a rural townland called Castletown-Kinneigh, 50 km west of Cork city, which meant a three-hour round trip for those travelling from the east of the county. Rarely were there enough bodies to even play a game of backs and forwards, and team spirit was pretty much non-existent.

McLaughlin moved the location of training to Nemo Rangers in Cork city to try to counteract the falling numbers, but invariably training started late, with players strolling across the car park from the changing rooms, with no repercussions for their poor timekeeping. They warmed up themselves, moping through the motions – and that’s how they played too.

As the county struggled at adult level, clubs were beginning to get their act together and soon their training became much more enticing to attend. Donoughmore were on the verge of winning their first senior All-Ireland club title in 2001, and for Juliet Murphy, and those like her, the approach of her club coach, Mossie Barrett, was far more beneficial to the improvement of her game.

‘With Donoughmore, you were expected to do four laps of the pitch before training even started. It was a given,’ Murphy reveals. ‘Club training was so good that you’d not be bothered going to Cork sessions. Mossie Barrett had us doing winter training. He had us doing hill training and we would have gone through a wall for him. He was motivating and he built up a great rapport with the players. That sadly wasn’t there with Cork.

‘We were always serious with Donoughmore, and the players realised that what we were doing was what was needed to take us to the next level, and it was competitive.

‘Mossie would say, “Right lads, we’re gone in twenty minutes”, and it was over with; whereas with Cork, you just never knew when a session would end.

‘We had a professional set-up with the club too and we’d a good sponsor, but we owned it too, as players. We took on the responsibility. At the end of the day, you’re talking about player fulfilment and self-actualisation. You go out and enjoy the game, and you come off wanting to learn more or improve. You didn’t want to feel dejected going out in the first place, but sadly we felt like that with Cork.’

The little things became important to Murphy and there was a realisation that standards needed to be set and kept, and she would live by that rule for the rest of her career.

Barrett made a point of hanging up their Donough­more jerseys around the dressing room before every game. It meant something. But, at a Cork game, oversized jerseys would be pulled out of a bag thrown in the middle of the floor. They might be washed, they might not. The players themselves would produce an array of different shorts and socks. There was no sense of unity and no sense of ownership.

The summer of 2001 epitomised the lack of direction and organisation. Midweek, the Cork senior team journeyed over the border to Abbeydorney to play Kerry in a Munster championship game. They travelled separately by car but agreed to meet in Ballygarry House in Tralee an hour or two before the game, but when McLaughlin got there, he was shocked to find that he didn’t have a full team.

‘I had been told by the county board that we’d have a team, but when we stopped, there was only a handful of players there. We started the game with thirteen, and two more players came late and started the second half, but it wasn’t good enough.

‘I asked the question afterwards why players wouldn’t play and was told it was because their club teams were playing championship matches the next evening. That wasn’t right. Players should have been given a few days, and I didn’t blame them for not coming out to play.’

Ten minutes before a Munster senior championship match, players were introducing themselves to each other in the dressing room. It was agonisingly disjointed and there was no sense of ownership from the top down – from the county board, from the coach, from the players. No one was taking responsibility. There was no accountability either, but it was about to get worse.

During the warm-up at the following game against Waterford in Dungarvan, McLaughlin took underage players down from the stand to start in a Munster senior championship game ahead of players on the bench who had trained with the team, albeit sporadically. One of those in the stand was future All-Star defender Deirdre O’Reilly, who was there to watch her sister play, but instead she made her senior debut, aged fifteen.

McLaughlin’s actions caused uproar among the clubs whose players were disregarded on the bench.

‘It was reported to the county board after that players were taken down out of the stand to play,’ McLaughlin recalls.

‘Yes, they were, but it was reported in the wrong context. We notified players to travel to Waterford and Deirdre didn’t realise she was part of the team and didn’t bring her gear. So I asked where she was and somebody said she was in the stand, and my understanding was she was part of the team.’

O’Reilly remembers it thus:

‘I was actually still only playing with the U16s and I had been lining out for the minors too, but that day I just went along to watch the seniors. The next thing someone came over to the stand and asked me to play, and sorted shorts and socks for me. I didn’t really know what was happening.

‘I had never played with the seniors before, but I just think there was a breakdown in communication.’

Either way, the incident proved how flimsily everything was thrown together, and McLaughlin’s decision that night unfortunately sent the wrong message about teamwork to the squad, and in particular to the substitutes.

‘It could have been harsh on the subs all right,’ he reflects, almost fifteen years on.

‘If we’d won, there might not have been the outcry there was. It’s a hard job and I’ve definitely felt the backlash from it, but I’d be big enough to take it and I’ve learnt from it big time.’

In the aftermath, a number of fringe players walked, but McLaughlin saw it coming long before that.

‘Some were playing other sports and we weren’t top of their priority list. It was difficult, too, because of some of the hammerings we got. It’s easier to keep going when you’re winning, people follow where success is. But then there were the divides …’

•••

Juliet Murphy tells how a club teammate once told her not to speak to a player from another club in the Cork dressing room. They laugh about it now, but that’s how it was.

Clubs were now tasting provincial and national glory, and Murphy’s Donoughmore were the most successful, winning their first senior All-Ireland club title in December 2001. On the day, they beat Ballyboden St Enda’s of Dublin, with captain Mary O’Connor lifting the Dolores Tyrrell Memorial Cup, and a fourteen-year-old by the name of Rena Buckley starting in defence. Player of the Match was Donoughmore forward Ruth Anne Buckley, who months before quit the Cork set-up after she was one of the substitutes overlooked for Rockchapel’s Deirdre O’Reilly that day in Dungarvan.

The same weekend Donoughmore claimed their senior All-Ireland club title, Rockchapel won the intermediate title, but there were no messages of congratulations sent between the two clubs. They despised each other, and their rivalry was tangible in the county team dressing room too. Donoughmore and Rockchapel county championship games were always explosive, with Mary Collins and her husband, Jessie, manning the line for ‘The Rock’, and Mossie Barrett, the Mourinho-like mastermind, doing the same for Donoughmore with his brother Tomás.

There’s no denying it, Donoughmore were hated, and it wasn’t just Rockchapel who hated them.

‘The animosity in the county dressing room definitely stemmed from club,’ recounts 2001 Donoughmore captain and dual star Mary O’Connor.

‘From a camogie context, we could beat the crap out of each other in a club camogie championship game, and the following night at Cork camogie training it wouldn’t even be discussed. But there was something in ladies football where we weren’t really able to forget about it.

‘It was familiarity breeds contempt, too. You’d be loyal to your club and we were young, too. We didn’t know any better.’

Donoughmore would arrive in convoy for their games, stopping first somewhere close by before entering the grounds together like a small army. It was their declaration that they had arrived, united. They were disliked for that, but they were ahead of the posse.

‘We probably isolated ourselves a little,’ admits Juliet Murphy, a thirteen-time Cork senior club championship medal winner with Donoughmore, ‘but we weren’t liked anyway. We were successful, so we were hated. We brought players in from outside the club and people didn’t like that, and I can see why people hated us. To be honest, we’d a certain amount of arrogance about us, too, but the players were very honest, and we trained extremely hard for what we won.

‘But it was really awkward in the Cork dressing room. I couldn’t stand the sight of a maroon jersey. Any time we played Rockchapel it was almost always under lights, back in Millstreet, with the rain lashing down. It just magnified the entire situation.

‘We hated them, and they us, but those nights were magical.’

2002

In 2002, things were still a mess. McLaughlin commenced his sixth season in charge, but there was still no provincial silverware. The reigning senior All-Ireland club champions Donoughmore had nineteen players representing Cork at all levels, but only three wore the red jersey at senior level. Things were fraying, and fraying fast.

Cork were now competing in division one, but only because the league had been revamped. The jump from division three didn’t help matters. In the third round, Cork won their first ever game in the top flight – against Meath in Mountmellick – but they did so with a patchwork side.

The Cork junior team played beforehand, but with eight senior players unavailable to McLaughlin for one reason or another, the juniors were asked to volunteer as subs after just playing their own game. It was ragball rovers, but Cork managed to pull off the win, and it only showed what could be achieved if things were a little more coordinated.

More players evaporated after this, however, and the void grew bigger than ever in an already shredded panel. A challenge match was organised by the Cork senior management team against Donoughmore to try to find momentum from somewhere, but it turned out to be a farce. Donoughmore turned up with thirty players at their disposal, but Cork couldn’t even muster a starting fifteen, and the club side had to lend bodies to what should be the county’s flagship side.

The players who had walked from the senior squad began to look elsewhere. They wanted to represent Cork, but not under a disorganised system as they saw it, and instead looked to the county’s junior set-up.

However, it wasn’t just the players who took action. Mary Collins of Rockchapel and Mossie Barrett of Donoughmore put their rivalry aside at club level and agreed to work together as selector and coach of the Cork junior team. In years to come, Eamonn Ryan would be singled out for breaking down the barriers of rivalry in the Cork dressing room, and to an extent he did, but it was the actions of Collins and Barrett in 2002 that first instigated a move towards cooperating together for the good of Cork football.

They combined to oversee Cork’s first provincial adult title in seven years, beating Limerick in the Munster junior championship final in Emly. On the starting fifteen, there were six Donoughmore players and five Rockchapel, and they too had buried their hatred for one other. There wasn’t exactly high-fiving, but there was a sense of relief – carrying all that baggage had become much too tiresome for everyone.

Cork scored five unanswered points to win, but the victory wasn’t about raising cups, it was about raising the idea that a united approach was the only way of moving forward.