Saturday, March 20, 2010
CORK defender Shane O’Neill expects tomorrow’s NHL opponents Waterford to pose as big a challenge as Kilkenny did last week.
O’Neill and his team-mates beat the All-Ireland champions by two points to gain some measure of revenge for last year’s hammering in Nowlan Park, but the Bishopstown clubman said that result is now history.
"It’s a good sign but at the same time it’s important not to get carried away — it’s not as if you get anything extra because you beat Kilkenny. It’s still only two points.
"But obviously we were pleased with the win, though once we were back training on Tuesday night we’d put it away, it was totally out of the system. Waterford away is going to be just as hard."
O’Neill hasn’t seen much of tomorrow’s opponents, but he concedes that Walsh Park is always a tough environment.
"I haven’t seen them play at all, but we’re aware that their more established players were given a break at the start of the year. Now most of them are back, so that’ll be a big advantage in the next few weeks — and we’ll have our work cut out for us tomorrow.
"Any time I’ve gone to Walsh Park — I’ve played one minor and two U21 games there, as well as a couple of league games — it’s always a tough place to go. It’ll be just as hard, physically and mentally as last week against Kilkenny."
There’s a lot of focus on Eoin Cadogan, who’s due to play for the Rebel footballers tonight against Dublin before heading east for tomorrow’s hurling game.
O’Neill says the hurlers are all behind the dual star.
"We’re not giving him a slagging at all, he’s got his head screwed on and he’s a good man to mind himself. Obviously Denis (Walsh) and Conor (Counihan) aren’t out to run him into the ground, they’re working together and I’m sure Eoin has an input into that as well.
"It’s great to see someone trying it — he’s been a great player for Douglas and Cork for the last couple of years and he’s a natural at both. It’s great that he has the courage to give it a good go."
O’Neill credits manager Denis Walsh with bringing in fresh faces: "It’s great, especially if you take the full-back and half-back lines, you have 11 or 12 serious players going for the same positions. If you’ve that for training and league games and so on then that brings in the level of competition for places that you want."
Finally, is the league more important this season than it has been traditionally for Cork?
"Definitely," says O’Neill. "With the change in the league format over the last couple of years, you can see it’s more competitive. Kilkenny have lost two games already, Tipp have lost a game — we have some very hard games left as well.
"The games are far more competitive, and we’re certainly taking them very seriously. We’re concentrating on winning each game as it comes but obviously it’s more helpful to have competitive games coming into the championship."
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