There’s a time for training but a time to switch off, too

At this time of year when you’d nearly get the impression that every county player would rather he was anything else, it’s worth bearing in mind that there have been some players that we haven’t heard complain about their plight.

“I’m really eager, really looking forward to this season,” Kevin McManamon told Marie Crowe for a piece that went out on RTÉ a few days into the new year. “I got a good break away from it and I’m itching to get going again.”

McManamon’s “good break away from it” included a few weeks Down Under, observing the work the late great Jim Stynes’s Reach Foundation is doing in Melbourne, as well as some general R&R.