O’Dwyer: Headcase Daly made for Dubs

Ryan O’Dwyer believes Anthony Daly — a ‘headcase’ whose colourful character perfectly suits the team — will stay on as Dublin hurling manager.

Former Clare boss Daly is currently considering whether to remain in charge of the Leinster champions for 2014 following their All-Ireland semi-final defeat to Cork.

Experienced forward O’Dwyer, controversially sent off in that game, said the players want Daly to remain, claiming his unique character has been key to getting the best out of the team.

“Every one of us wants him to stay,” said O’Dwyer. “He’s a headcase. But he suits us down to the ground. We need him. I honestly think that he’ll feel there’s unfinished business there.

“He has a lot of things to evaluate himself. He has a family in Clare. It’s a long distance up, a couple of times a week so we’ll leave him at it and see what he comes back to us with, but I think he knows that every one of us wants him and, yeah, I think he’ll stay on.”

Former Limerick player Maurice O’Brien has hung up his hurl but O’Dwyer doesn’t envisage any other retirements.

“I think I’m the eighth oldest now,” said the centre-forward. “Mossy is gone and I’m sad he is because I’d be close with him. He’s married and has a kid on the way so he had to ask himself a lot of questions. But I’d say Mossy will be the only one who goes.

“I think everyone else feels we have unfinished business, that they’ll put the heads down and go again.”

Dublin chiefs are currently in the process of appealing O’Dwyer’s red card picked up against Cork. If the dismissal is rescinded, he will be the third high-profile player to have a red card overturned in the championship.

“I can honestly say that 10 or 15 years ago, none of them [incidents] would have been sending offs and the yellow cards would be dropped because if you even make contact with someone now, it’s a free,” said O’Dwyer. “You make contact with them and they fall over and act hurt for a while and it’s a yellow. I don’t know, I just think, not the referees, but the people over it should give more accountability to the refs to ref the game with common sense.

“I don’t blame the refs, they’re doing what they’ve been told. The standard is being dictated by whoever governs the referees.”

Despite the defeat to Cork, O’Dwyer has backed Clare to come out on top in next month’s All-Ireland final.

“Each game that goes on, they’re getting better and better,” he said. “You saw the last day against Limerick, they were so sharp. And it’s not as if Limerick weren’t at the races, Limerick were good as well. Clare were just outstanding.

“If you put a gun to my head now, I’d have to say Clare. But with Jimmy Barry-Murphy over Cork, you can never rule them out. He’s a shrewd operator, comes across as a gentleman but I’d say behind the scenes he’s very shrewd.”