Cork's 'stay' plea to O'Grady

CORK'S All-Ireland winners want Donal O'Grady to continue as manager after guiding them to a 29th All-Ireland hurling title win.

Last night, Cork Secretary, Frank Murphy, also made it clear that they will do all in their power to persuade the manager to stay on.

Team captain Ben O'Connor agreed it would be important for O'Grady to stay involved, but said that they would respect whatever decision he makes.

O'Grady himself had privately hinted in advance of Sunday's final that he would be stepping down, but he was non-committal when asked yesterday.

At the same time, he didn't rule it out.

"There's always a future, you never say never," he said.

"We were appointed for two years and that was it. That ended at midnight last [Sunday] night."

He deflected the inevitable question about the practice of successful managements being re-appointed that operates in Cork, saying it should be directed at the County Board.

"They have an executive function in that, far be it from me to interfere with that. That would be like members of the Fianna Fáil party asking Bertie are they in or out of the cabinet!"

Frank Murphy was emphatic that the executive would wish him to stay. "There's no doubt about that, the two-year term is completed, but they have completed it on an emphatic winning note.

"It is tradition in Cork that an All-Ireland winning selection committee is re-appointed if they wish to do so. We would be exhorting them to stay and have a go at retention of the title next year.

"That would be what the players would want and we would be totally 100% behind that. There is always provision for county champions, but they mightn't change either ... that's another day's work.

"Nonetheless, we would be saying that we would be very hopeful that the same management would stay in place. We will be persuading him as best we can to continue at the helm."

Murphy said it was generally accepted that O'Grady had been an inspired choice as manager, taking over after the public blood-letting at the tail-end of 2002, when he was part of the management which opted out at the request of the playing panel.

"Donal is a man who exercises a great discipline, and is an extraordinary administrator in the educational sphere. We had no doubt that he would do a good job. He is a very dedicated man, even down to the minutest detail. He certainly performed remarkably over the two years, and did extraordinary work for Cork hurling.

"The hurling was there in Cork all the time, but he brought the best out of the team, supported by his colleagues. It was a tremendous achievement to bring the team to two All-Ireland finals. They were unlucky the first occasion, but there was no doubt about this win."

Relaxing in the Burlington Hotel yesterday before the team left on their train journey home, O'Grady said that he didn't view the team's success in terms of putting a few ghosts to rest.

"Reflecting on last year we could have done things a little differently not during the match, I would dispute that with anybody but pre-match. Little things went wrong. It was nice to get the second chance to ensure that would not happen again."

And, there was no question of him gloating about things right, or of answering criticism.

His attitude was that everybody was entitled to his opinion, but that he had his own views about how the team should play and who should play where.

"That's part of the game. The days you win, you'll get no criticism and you might make far more mistakes than the day you lose. It's par for the course," he said.

"They [critics] have never affected me. I have never gone to bed thinking 'should we have done this' or 'should we have done' that on the field of play.

"What happened last year was that we had to come out on the field at a certain time, but the tunnel was blocked with presentations and we couldn't get out in time. Looking back, I think that affected the players a bit. We made sure that wouldn't happen this year."

While revealing that he had been quietly confident of winning, O'Grady accepted that Cork were lucky the way the season worked out for them.

"I'm on record as saying I was never a great fan of the backdoor. A championship is a championship. Once you're beaten you're beaten, and that's it. Waterford deserved to win on the day in Thurles. We couldn't break them down for the last six or seven minutes, we just couldn't get the scores.

"Beating Tipperary gave us a great fillip and a very handy draw against Antrim. Let's be honest, it gave us an easy-enough display, a run out in Croke Park, a confidence-builder. Then the game against Wexford was similar. We came in the final high on confidence.

"I rate this Cork team very highly. I don't think Kilkenny did anything last year that would frighten us. We were up for this game, we got our second chance and at no stage did I feel uncomfortable except for maybe the five minutes after half-time when we struggled to go ahead. But once we got ahead I felt we were going to do it."

Added Frank Murphy: "No one expected an easy game against Kilkenny, traditionally they are renowned for doughty fighters, especially in All-Ireland finals.

"It wouldn't be won simply on sheer brilliance of hurling. There was a period in the ten minutes before half time when you could see that the team was settled and they were really in the game at half-time.

"Their performance in the second half was superb, particularly the blanket defence work that limited Kilkenny to just two points."