McCarthy reaping hard work’s reward

A QUICK glance at his notebook and Justin McCarthy calculates he has taken 600 training sessions and driven over 80,000 miles in the service of Waterford hurling.

In that time he has guided the side to two Munster final victories (the first, in 2002 bridging a 39-year gap), three All-Ireland semi-final appearances and, earlier this year, a long overdue League title.

In pure hurling terms, he agrees one of his main priorities on taking charge was to improve skill levels.

“Even during the winter, on bad nights up in Aglish, Clashmore and these places, we had the hurleys with us,” he recalled. “We hurled every night. I remember one particular game, when we played Meath in Dungarvan in 2002, on a very cold day, I said to myself that our standard was very poor.

“Waterford were noted for having very good hurlers. My idea was that it was very important to bring up that level of skill and consistency at how they play the game at a very high level.

“There’s such a thing as hurling fitness. And there’s physical fitness. You must combine both. You’ll get fellows who can hurl all day but they couldn’t hurl at pace, which is very important.”

He also worked on their confidence, getting the players to believe that ‘they could win something.’ “The first night I had a meeting, I remember saying to Fergal Hartley that nothing would satisfy me unless we had a cup next summer. That was the bottom line.

“In fairness, the lads took it all on board. And we won the 2002 championship.”

Enhancing skill levels remains high on the agenda.

“I am a great believer in developing talent — or seeing talent maybe at an earlier stage and trying to develop it. That is the challenge for me. You know you’re not going to get all ‘ready-mades.’

“They’re not going to come through on the conveyor belt from minor and U21, which isn’t there.

“There’s no limit to what you can do when you go about it properly and have the proper application, the proper training and proper coaching and so on. Sometimes teams need more coaching than managing.”

Winning the League title this year marked a further step in the development of the team. In practical terms, it gave them three good games in the knock-out stages, against Tipperary, Cork and Kilkenny. The final was ‘a very good game’ for them — for the obvious reason that Kilkenny ‘are’ the benchmark, a very strong, forceful team with all the natural skills and tradition.

“And it was a national title,’’ he emphasises. “Don’t forget Waterford hadn’t won it for 40-odd years.’’ Going into a Munster semi-final against Cork or Clare meant that they would still have a long break and for that reason they brought the squad to Portugal. There, they trained two or three times a day at a top-class facility that’s regularly used by international squads.

“The place was ideal and it sorted us out again. The League was gone, we had to put it to one side,’’ he explained.

With Cork enveloped in the controversy over the suspended players, he made sure that they didn’t ‘complicate’ things for themselves. In essence, the message he had for his squad from the beginning was that if the players were not available, there would be others to take their place.

And, he was satisfied that they would be ‘well equipped and well up to speed in the Cork tradition.’

“We weren’t caught up behind the scenes. We had to be good enough ourselves to play, because in the championship there’s going to be no easy game for anyone. Players can ‘up’ their game in the championship and they (Cork) had something to go for — pride number one and for the players who weren’t there.

“Both teams were very tuned in and they were very sharp in relation to what they could do. But, every game is different. The final will be totally different. The League final wasn’t as open. It was harder to get scores, more of a physical challenge, with stronger players around you had to contend with.

“Limerick are quite a strong forceful team. They can hurl too and they won’t give in. I don’t think you’ll see a classic. You’ll see a typical tough Munster championship game. The hunger in their play is quite evident. They could have lost any of the three games but they dug in and stood their ground. It’s part of their game that they don’t give in and the realisation now that they are in the final will make it that bit harder for us.”