‘Our aim is to get some respect for the jersey’
When Conor Counihan’s Aghada set off for challenge games, they often headed east, playing the likes of John Kiely’s Kilrossanty outfit in Waterford.
Counihan was box office, but a starred career with the Cork seniors wasn’t proof against Kiely’s slagging, however.
It was raw material.
“I often say to him he was right lucky,” says Kiely, “Lucky that he was playing around the same time as the greatest Cork footballer ever, Stephen O’Brien, and warriors like Niall Cahalane, Teddy McCarthy and Larry Tompkins. ‘Counihan, you were born at the right time’, I often say to him.”
The Waterford man can’t maintain the necessary straight face, however: “Ah, Conor’s a lovely guy. You’d never get him excited. And he was one of the all-time great centre-backs, don’t get me wrong.”
You don’t direct a conversation with John Kiely, Waterford football manager and unofficial holder of the title of Most Popular Interview In Irish Sport. You don’t even referee the chat: you just throw in the ball and swallow the whistle.
A potted history of the GAA in Waterford is one brief stop – “There were county championships in Waterford in 1885 and 1886, where else were they going on in the country?” – and the advantages of roughage in the diet are well aired (“Plenty of oranges, you couldn’t get better.”)
There’s a terrific yarn about falling asleep on the bus from Malaga to Torremolinos which would require a HBO mini-series to do it complete justice, and a couple of tips on horses which he counsels against publishing in a national newspaper for reasons directly related to the possible effect on how turf accountants might relate said information to the odds on said horses.
And then there’s tomorrow’s clash against Cork.
Kiely knows a lot of the men in red well from the interprovincial scene, having been involved with Munster last year. Representing the province is good preparation for the Waterford players, he says, citing players like the O’Gorman twins, Maurice and Thomas, who have benefited hugely from the competition.
“Our lads take the Munster team seriously, we had four on the panel last year, but so did the likes of Nicholas Murphy and Michael Cussen from Cork, in fairness. Nicholas came out for us a couple of weeks after winning a county with his own club, Carrigaline.
“Thomas (O’Gorman) marked Brian Dooher when we played Ulster, and Dooher got on the ball twice, I’d say. I said it to him at half-time and Thomas said, ‘I’ve your man twigged, he takes a break for a minute after making a long run’. So he knew he could drive up the field at those times. Maurice marked Davy Harte in the same game. That’s great experience for them.”
Still, Cork are hot favourites and not only for tomorrow. They’re fancied by many observers to be in the shake-up later on in the year. What’s it like to be cast in the role of sacrificial lambs trembling on the altar? “Look, a realistic assessment would be that Cork are in the top four, at least, in the country. The bottom line with that is they haven’t played Tyrone or Dublin in the last couple of years, though I’d fancy they could beat Dublin. If Tyrone were at full strength in Croke Park, I’m not sure.
“I think Tyrone are the best team in Ireland. I don’t understand Kerry being 13/8 favourites with the bookies. But Cork are definitely in the top three.
“They have the talent to win it but they have some work to do, there might be areas on the team the management wouldn’t be completely happy with, but it’s always a matter of getting all the pieces of the jigsaw in place, and no better man than Conor to do it.”
Kiely often points the truck west on summer evenings. Having worked for years in Cork – he still does a lot of business in the county – there’s hardly a club ground in the Rebel County he doesn’t know. It’s one trump in his hand for tomorrow.
“One advantage we’d have is that I know all the Cork players, I’ve seen them playing with their clubs and if someone mentioned Paddy Kelly or whoever then I know who he is and what he’s like.”
He’s fond of Cork, but there are reasons. And being John Kiely, it’s no surprise to hear that reason is GAA-based.
“I’ve good time for Cork people,” he says. “I feel it’s a real sporting county. You’d meet people from some other counties and they’d be looking at you as if to say ‘what would ye know about it’, but it’s similar in Cork, it’s all football in the west and more hurling in the east. Those people know what it is we’re trying to do.
“Our main aim over the last couple of years has been to get some respect for the Waterford jersey, and the players have bought into that, in fairness.”
It’s a serious point. Beyond the yarns and the jokes, he points out that in Waterford the footballers’ backroom team put in the same amount of homework as any county’s management set-up.
“Coming up to the game you might have to organise gear for late arrivals on the panel, fellas are ringing for information on players for the match programme, you’ve to ring physios about players’ fitness, you’ve to ring players to talk about things and sound them out ... there’s a lot to do, and we take that seriously.”
When it’s not so serious he has a lot to do as well. The night before we met a pal rang him from north Cork to say he felt sorry for the Waterford boss, adding with mock-mournful sincerity that he supposed Kiely would be hoping the ground would open up and swallow him at full-time tomorrow in Fraher Field if they’re well beaten. “No chance,” says Kiely, with a grin. No chance is right.
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