Patrick Horgan interview: 'Very few get to decide themselves when to leave, and to leave when they’re happy. And I am happy'
PERFECT POSE: The prolific Patrick Horgan was radar like from placed balls with his distinctive style. Pic: Bryan Keane, Inpho
Last Friday night he pocketed 2-9 for Glen Rovers but Midleton found a couple of extra points and squeezed through to the semi-final of the Cork Premier SHC. For Patrick Horgan, it was disappointment and freedom at the same time: He could finally reveal his plan for next year with Cork.
There isn’t one.
“I’d say my close friends probably would know, by the way I've been speaking to them for the last few weeks. It’s something I've been just thinking about a while, but obviously I wanted to push all my efforts into the championship matches with the Glen, I didn’t want to say anything at all while the club championship was on.”
He’s content with the decision to step back from the inter-county stage.
“I'm probably one of the luckiest people playing hurling, because a very small percentage of people get to decide themselves when to leave, and to leave when they’re happy.
“And I am happy. I don’t know if it’s a GAA thing where players wait and wait and wait, then they leave and they’re unhappy, and they dislike people, all of that.
“If I did play on with Cork it's not as if I wouldn't have put my whole life into it again. I would have. But there are other things - even (son) Jack, I see him growing so quickly and I’m out of the house all the the time training. It’s just something I wanted to do myself.”
An All-Ireland medal would have been a great thing. But not everything, as he says.
“There were lots of good memories and good days - savage days - and winning one would have been nice, but I’ve said it for a long time, it’s not everything.
“Do the maths and you could be at 180 or 200 sessions in a year, so it can't be just about one day. If you train 200 times in a year with a great bunch of lads and you’re enjoying it, you’re a long way to being happy. And that’s what I did.
“If I wasn't enjoying myself, I wouldn't have been down at training at five o'clock every every single day to train at quarter to seven. I enjoyed every minute of it, I was absolutely happy to be training with the best players in Cork, a crowd of people that I created really good friendships with. I’ll miss that part of it but I’m happy with the decision.”
Asked to pick one opponent, he unfurls an all-star cast.
“You’d go a long way to get better than JJ Delaney but I was lucky too, because I was so into hurling that I got to play with all these players that I’d looked up to.
“I remember being up Thurles as a kid looking at Seán Óg Ó hAilpín and Dan Shanahan mark each other, just watching down from the stand - then I’m in the dressing-room with Seán Óg, and playing against Dan even though he's up the other end of the field.
“Marking JJ, and you're looking out the field at Tommy (Walsh), and Henry Shefflin is around the place. Quality.
“Eoin Kelly of Tipperary - I admired him for so many years. Down the Páirc (Uí Chaoimh) one time Eoin was playing against Cork and I was looking on from the sideline, delighted to be watching him. Afterwards I got to play against him. I'm delighted with that. All of it.”
One night? Try Limerick in the Páirc two years ago, when he stitched a last-minute penalty into the Blackrock End goal and sent a city mad.
“That was a real turning point for us. We had good support before that, but then it just went to something we've never seen before. All the things that happened on the night, the excitement, the stories that come out of it, and people in the crowd saying it was better than any All-Ireland... those are things people remember, and that's the important part.
“The team is a very, very close group, even as a forward line, or an inside forward lane, there were four or five or six of us we all got on really well - myself, Alan Connolly, Brian Hayes, Paudie Power, all of them. Always sharing strategies, how to create a little bit of separation. We really had each others’ backs as regards wanting to create a good environment, and that’s huge credit to Pat, obviously.”
That’s Pat Ryan, the manager. He won’t be on the sideline for Cork next year either and Horgan pays due tribute: “It’s no reflection on other managers but everyone knows how tough a year he had, and the way he carried himself was unbelievable. I don't know where he got the strength to do it in probably the hardest year of his life, whether we won the All Ireland or not.
“How he handled those weeks... we were upset for him, obviously, which comes back to how close he had the whole group. We felt the pain for him, and we did our best to be to be there for him. It's just a pity we couldn't give him the big prize.”
The future? There’s a book in the works. Work with Dulux Paints Ireland. He’s already looking forward to the games next year. (“Will I go to Cork matches? Of course I will.”)
He’s also interested in preparing teams: “I’d have an interest in actual coaching - in the last, say, 10 years the learning curve has been crazy as regards skills and in-play situations. I’d think there's a there's a lot of room in and around there for coaching, and for giving players an edge. Deccie O’Sullivan introduced that to me around 2016 and the benefits I've seen through that were just immense. I just had to change my game. And to be fair to him, he helped me to do that.”
He leaves records behind him - top scorer in senior hurling championship, in the National Hurling League - but those “just kind of happened, with the amount of the games you end up playing”, he says.
“I laugh about those to an extent because I'll be honest, my dream was to play senior for the Glen. I spent so much time down there with my Dad - every single night of my life, it seemed.
“Down there watching the seniors training, and that's all I wanted to do too, was play for the Glen.”
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