Proving it every week only way to stop Cats
With his team already securing a spot in the playoffs, Belichick is walking through a hallway when there, in the background, is aprinted banner posted on the wall. The camera doesn’t zone in on it, Belichick makes no reference to it, casual observers mightn’t even notice it, but it says everything about the culture Belichick has created in New England: PROVE IT EVERY WEEK.
Maybe Belichick lifted it from Cody since Cody didn’t get it from Belichick but whatever way you look at it, Kilkenny prove it every week. Every day, they play like there’s something at stake.
Unfortunately Tipperary brought no such mindset to Nowlan Park. More alarmingly their performance was probably a true reflection of their current mindset. And that is: things are not right.
After last year’s league final when nearly everyone — even Cody himself — had doubts about Kilkenny’s capacity to relieve Tipp of their All-Ireland crown, this column predicted Kilkenny would still win it all on the premise that they had the best combination of players and management, Tipp included.
“We’re not sure about Tipp this year,” we wrote, “because we’re not sure about Declan Ryan. We do think he’ll reach the Munster final, if only because the Cork and Clare setups are so unconvincing.
“Ryan successfully succeeded Sheedy as a minor manager but at senior every possible shortcoming is magnified. No one would expect or want Ryan to be another Sheedy, but being so less communicative than Sheedy could backfire. As Sheedy appreciated, there is more to hurling than hurling, and you wonder is Ryan proactive enough to seek ways to inspire players accustomed to being inspired.”
Sadly for Ryan and Tipp, those concerns are now widespread. As is evident by every honest post-match interview he gives, Ryan’s integrity remains intact but the impression now is of an honourable man currently in over his head. Kilkenny may be constantly communicating with their players individually and collectively but as the likes of Sheedy and Donal O’Grady and John Allen understood, to beat the Godzilla that’s Kilkenny, that’s the kind of culture you must create.
Ryan’s not the only manager to fall victim to the unfavourable comparison game. It did not surprise us that Tony Considine in these pages laid most of the blame for Tipp’s current difficulties on the players. Tony, like every other Clare manager in the past five seasons, had no proper appreciation of the magical player-centred culture that Anthony Daly cultivated in his three-year tenure as Banner boss. Gerald McCarthy’s misfortune was to come after Donal O’Grady and John Allen rather than before them. Babs Keating, like Michael Doyle, looked old school to a group of players that had worked with as progressive a coach as Nicky English. In each case, the players had seen the future and that it worked.
It is demoralising for a group of elite players when they see the standard of management regressing. They don’t mind management making mistakes — what management doesn’t? — but they want one that’s open to learning from them and to genuine two-way communication. Tony made the point in defence of Ryan it took Sheedy three years to win his All-Ireland. But in those three years, Tipp and their whole setup were improving, learning.
Is Ryan open to or capable of such change? Lar Corbett would still be playing for Tipp if he thought the answer was a definitive affirmative. We’ll probably see him back in the blue and gold some day — but probably not until a Sheedy or Eamon O’Shea returns.
Tony Considine is right on one level, of course. The players should be driving the thing. But it is management who must create that culture, one that constantly seeks and values great communication. If it got out that the Tipp hurlers called a players-only meeting in the coming days about how they needed to step it up, they wouldn’t be so much praised for taking some initiative and responsibility but probably castigated for such insubordination. It is up to management to create such a forum and culture for players to express themselves, including their viewpoints. No team, not in this era of Cody, can win an All-Ireland in spite of its management.
Tipp are not beyond redemption. In Tommy Dunne they still have one of the brightest coaches in hurling. Ryan will have done a lot of soul-searching after last Sunday. Hurling needs him to. Because for all Kilkenny’s brilliance in the Cody era, their dominance has been as much devalued as facilitated by the self-destruction of every proper champion they’ve faced. Tipp post-English, Cork post-Allen. It doesn’t need Tipp to go the same way post-Sheedy.
