Champions lose the call in Cork

CORK County Board last night sensationally broke with a long-standing tradition by abolishing the county champions’ right to automatically have a selector or the captaincy on all county teams.

In another major departure, the meeting decided that a seven-man committee, comprising of four from the Executive and three from the clubs, would pick the manager and selectors of the county senior football team for 2008.

The captaincy issue arose from a motion submitted on behalf of the Ballinhassig club by their delegate Donal Coleman. He cited the case of Brian Corcoran, who commented in his book that, at 19 years old, he found it very uncomfortable to be talking to players who were far more experience than he was back in 1993.