Eamon
As sympathies go, Eamon O’Shea’s would lie closer to Arsenal than Manchester United, but his activities last October bore the hallmarks of Govan-like politicking only with lighter brushstrokes.
Ferguson had a bank of achievement to deign himself kingmaker as well as king. O’Shea in his two seasons as manager has yet to win silverware, as much as that 2010 All-Ireland title as coach was a beacon of success.
But coming just weeks after two epic final jousts with Kilkenny, the wind was blowing in O’Shea’s favour last October when he not only agreed on a third season but convinced the board executive to pre-appoint his selector Michael Ryan as his successor in 2016.
Egotism is not one of the Cloughjordan man’s failings, but it could be forgiven if those looking on might have regarded it as a trip. His only concern, though, was the posterity of Tipperary hurling.
“I really believe this is simply handing on – it’s all the time about trying to push the thing on and giving it back,” he said last May. “Because you don’t own it. The manager doesn’t own it and the players don’t own it.”
In a recent interview with the Irish Times, he spoke again of the transience of the position he’s in. “When I drive down through Tipp to training in the evenings . . . when I drive through the towns . . . the ghosts are in your head all the time. You realise what is going on.
"The team is the team now. The team will change. I will change. I will be gone. Next year. I will be gone. And to me, you can almost sense it. You know, that the engagement in the game is still there. There is an essence to the game. That is what you represent: the voices that are gone and have yet to come.”
It’s not as if the players didn’t want him to stay. Anything but. Kieran Bergin made that perfectly clear just before last October’s news. “To be honest, I can’t see anyone else replacing him. Someone else coming in would find it very hard to get the respect of the players.
“It’s hard to explain the bond that’s there. He’s a great manager, very intelligent and he’s as honest as the day is long. He’s so honest to players, he’ll tell everything out but he’ll never criticise us at the same time. It’s very hard to explain.
"All the players are mad about him. I think everyone would be devastated. It would be very hard for someone to turn and follow somebody else especially when we’re so close to getting over the line.”
But what sort of effect will this long goodbye have on the men? His pending departure means results like last Sunday’s in Parnell Park take on more of a significance (as much as Tipperary’s poor league starts are anything but strange).
Lose to Galway in Thurles tomorrow and his farewell tour will come into the firing line, notwithstanding the harsh truth Tipperary don’t have the depth to sustain season-long consistency like Kilkenny.
But what if that loss to Dublin is the first sign of another 2013? If so, will Ryan’s mandate as manager-elect come under question? There is the danger of O’Shea’s actions last October becoming a noose around Tipperary’s neck this year.
The finality of the season looms large. However, the picture is crystal clear: in between seven and 12 games’ time, O’Shea will be gone and Ryan, a man sharing a similar philosophy, will take over. Seamless security.
“I think it’s a positive thing,” said one leading sports psychologist, who wished to remain anonymous, of O’Shea’s arrangements.
“When it does happen that he goes, there’s no shock. He’s totally committed to whatever he’s doing and the players know that it being his last year, he’ll be 100% committed. It won’t detract from them. This happens in the workplace all the time with contracts and retirements.
"The leader wants to go out on a good note too so those working under him tend to put a lot more into that year. There’s a sense of clarity and purpose about the year. If they’re close to the manager, the players will want to work harder for him.
“It’s unusual for sport. Usually, it’s very sudden or there’s acrimony or the manager simply walks away after a team gets beaten. But there’s a trend beginning in the GAA along this line, albeit slowly.”
A coach without borders, O’Shea has shown himself to be a pioneer as manager. Not of the abstinent kind, he hopes, when it comes to silverware.
