Rangers reap the rewards of powerful club ethos
So is the next generation after that.
On Saturday, Nemo won the Cork minor football title against Macroom in Páirc Uí Rinn; call it company for the county U21 title they won earlier in the year. Explained minor coach Sean Hayes: “They’re a good bunch, and have been together since the age of eight. We actually have 28 players on the age, and we had three minor teams in competition this year for the first time.
“In addition to that, 12 of them played on the U21 team and they won the county as well. We’ve put two of them on the senior panel, Ray Heaphy and David Kearney.”
Nemo don’t believe in leaving player retention to chance, so next year that crop of minors will be given plenty of game time to stay involved.
“We’re going to try to put out two junior teams in the City Division next year and keep all the lads who are just out of minor in one team. You have to give them games, or else you’re not going to keep them, they’ll just lose interest. Even if they’re only small kids, if they get games they’re happy.
“When it comes to minors getting a chance to make the senior team later, the good lads progress on, and the other handy lads see that and they know their chance will come.”
It’s not as if those players don’t know each other, in any case. Much is made of Nemo’s relatively small player constituency and in the past they’ve used it as motivation for big games. It has a more prosaic application as well.
“During the summer the Cork seniors are away with the county,” says Hayes, “The minors and seniors all fall in together for training then. Without going on about it too much, the small size of the club means the senior players all know the minors and vice versa.”
That means when the minors reach a final, like last Saturday, they attract some fairly stellar support.
Spectators at Páirc Uí Rinn could see Ephie Fitzgerald and Jimmy Kerrigan on the line, for example. Fitzgerald is manager of the senior team and Kerrigan was coaching the senior defenders, but that doesn’t mean they’re above helping out with the younger teams.
“Jimmy (Kerrigan) and Ephie (Fitzgerald) helped out with the minors Saturday night, but in fairness, we all help out,” says Hayes.
“If I’m not there for the minors on a particular night, then some of the other lads will fall in to look after them. For example, Eddie Kirwan did a lot of coaching with the senior team this year, and they might be training from 6 to 7 in the evening. The minors would then train from 7 to 8, so it’s natural that lads would help out with each team if they’re needed.”
With that kind of double-jobbing on the part of the coaches, it’s no wonder that each side in the club is known for the same style of play. As Hayes says, if every lad is training in the same way from a young age, then they slot naturally into the system when they reach the adult teams. Still, the code second-closest to Nemo hearts provided one of the few sour notes to the club’s first season at their new premises.
“Since going to the new club we’ve won three county titles and a Munster club,” says Hayes. “The biggest disappointment was losing the intermediate hurling. Even though we’re known as a football club there’s a great grá for the hurling in Nemo.
“There’s no real clash with the football - the fellas who play hurling want to play hurling, and lads have no problem helping to run the team. I did a couple of years with them and Dinny Allen was there before me. The lads who want to play hurling just keep playing, it’s not a problem.”
When it comes to the big ball, Nemo learn to win early.
Last Saturday, long before the minor team won their county title, Nemo’s U-13 footballers won a city championship, and you can be sure they didn’t do it by booting the ball long and aimlessly. Just as the present generation are reaching veteran status, there’ll be another crop coming to fruition.
Maybe dispersal to other sports is the answer to Nemo’s dominance. Spectators at that minor final last Saturday saw a youngster score two fine points - Barry O’Driscoll played in an under-15 league final early on Saturday and came on against Macroom later in the evening. O’Driscoll is home on holidays from Ipswich Town FC, where he’s training with the U-16s and U-18s.
What odds would you give against Ipswich adopting an unorthodox but successful short-passing support game in the next 12 months?
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