Mullane: ‘one man band’ tag motivated us

DE LA Salle star John Mullane revealed they were “aggrieved” that a Cork radio station had described his club side as a one-man team and used that to inspire them to their one-point Munster club championship win over Sarsfields last Sunday.

“The lads were a bit annoyed that a comment was made on one of the Cork radio stations during the week,” said Mullane. “A couple of lads were aggrieved by it and that’s what they brought to the table last Sunday.”

Mullane’s freetaking was erratic and he admitted he’s not a natural with the placed ball.

“James Quirke was our regular free-taker but I’ve come in to do it now, it went well until Sunday, which was a bad day at the office, but we got the win. If I’m asked to do it again the next day I’ll step up.”

De La Salle had the bare minimum to spare after a sterling team effort against the Cork champions.

“We were just relieved,” said Mullane. “I had an off-day but we got through. Kevin (Moran) and Bryan (Phelan) are intercounty players and they stepped up to the plate, but Ian Twomey and Stephen Daniels were also good, there were some fantastic displays from our lads.

“It’s been a great year and it’d be great to end it by winning a Munster club – Thurles Sars are formidable but we’re battle-hardened and we won’t take any fears into the game. We don’t know a lot about them but we have experience from two years ago and hopefully that’ll stand to us. We’d want to rectify what happened against Portumna that season, we’re probably better balanced now as a team.”

Part of that balance is supplied by Kevin Moran, now at centre-back. He confessed he’d never hit as good a score as the equaliser last Sunday: “No, the emotion of it, the adrenaline in my body, that made it special, particularly for a defender! I was delighted – for myself, for the teammates, the supporters. I thought we deserved a draw.

“We needed a test like that, we found it hard since the Waterford final to get challenge matches, so you end up playing challenges against yourselves, so you don’t know how lads are going.”

Moran also acknowledged Thurles Sarsfields’ quality: “They’re a very good team, they had a good win over Kilmallock, by five or six points. We know that: we played Kilmallock earlier in the summer so we know how good they are. But we’ll head back training tomorrow night and get ourselves right for it.”