Eye on the Prize

HE HAS made so many memorable saves, but the defining moment of Donal Óg Cusack’s career to date happened not on the field, but off it.

He won’t be happy to read that, in the way that Marc Bosman wouldn’t appreciate a similar statement, but he should be. On August 20 last year, the Cork goalkeeper took his courage in his hands, took his hurling life in his hands, stepped outside the box.

In an interview that was not just a seminal moment in his career but in the storied history of Cork hurling, he went on radio and opened up on the shoddy treatment of the best players in the county by the richest county board in the country. Opened up on the Cork County Board. You know that image of the young student in Tiannaman Square, facing down the line of tanks? Leap of imagination perhaps, but put that in a sporting setting and you begin to understand the enormity of what Cusack was doing. Other players in other counties might have done so, but Cork? Who would have the audacity, the temerity, to challenge their eternal system?