Cahalane: we stand by our senior stars

CORK’S Under-21s footballers would have refused any request to fill the breach left by their striking senior counterparts had they been asked to do so by the county board.

“We wouldn’t have (played) because a lot of us had friends on the senior panel,” said Castlehaven’s Sean Cahalane, a member of last year’s U-21 All-Ireland winning side.

“They wouldn’t have wanted us to be dragged into it and, if it had been asked of us, we would have declined.

“Thank God, we had nothing to do with it. We were training away. We had nothing to do with trainers or reporters or anything like that.

“We were delighted to get on with our own thing and I’m just glad it’s all over and done with now.”

Less than half of last year’s victorious panel will return for this year’s U-21 competition but Cahalane is confident that Cork can still claim a fifth straight Munster title and challenge hard to reclaim their national title to boot.

The county’s is a hugely impressive record of late at the grade and one that Cahalane attributes to an abundance of talented players, as well as the management skills of Tony Leahy, John Cleary and Bill Herlihy.

Cleary has taken over from Leahy as manager of the U-21s this term but Cahalane has backed the latter to one day become the senior manager, a role in which he expressed an interest prior to Conor Counihan’s appointment.

“I am involved with CIT, where he is the main man, and I find him very good altogether. A top, top manager. He is involved with his club St Finbarr’s as well but hopefully, down the line, he will take the senior job.”

Leahy’s success at the U-21 grade hasn’t sat well in Kerry, who have suffered a nightmare run at the grade. Their last All-Ireland title came in 1998 and it is six years since they last claimed provincial honours.

Waterford famously defeated a side containing talents like Colm Cooper, Kieran Donaghy and Declan O’Sullivan in the 2003 Munster decider. The Kingdom has been eliminated at the first hurdle this past two seasons, Clare doing the honours in 2007.

Kerry will look to go some way towards redeeming themselves on March 15 when they face Limerick. The winners face Cork one week later and the signs are that Kerry will be a far tougher proposition this year.

Aside from Killian Young, new manager Sean Geaney can call on a number of other senior panellists, Paul O’Connor, Kieran O’Leary, Tommy Walsh and David Moran among them. “People are getting a bit worried that there’s nothing coming through but we always have the one or two players coming into the senior grade and it’s a great opportunity for a lot of the U-21s this year coming into it,” said the South Kerry defender.

“Sean Geaney is manager and selector with the seniors so they’re going to be spotted more. There’s more challenge games being arranged between the U-21s and seniors and it gives a great few lads an opportunity to make a mark for themselves.”

Had matters gone differently at last month’s Special Congress, Young and his colleagues could have found themselves playing the last U-21 Championship before the introduction of a two-year U-19 experiment.

“I do think it is a very valuable grade,” said Young who welcomed the U-21 competition’s stay of grace. “I am actually delighted it is still existing. If you went down to U-19s or got rid of it, you would have players coming out playing county level at minor and not getting a chance in a year or two.”

GAA president Nickey Brennan expressed his disappointment after Special Congress that “emotion” had clouded delegates’ judgement in voting on the U-19 proposal which was designed to tackle the issue of player burnout. However, he was on hand yesterday to launch the Cadburys U-21 Football Championship and gave the grade his full backing.

“We put that to rest,” he said of the U-19 proposal. “We dealt with that matter. There is obviously some unfinished business in relation to burnout which we will address post-Congress.

“The quality of the competitions was never at stake here. We have had some great matches down the years.”