Former Cork boss Counihan on life out of the spotlight

More than six weeks since he decided to step down as Cork senior football manager, Conor Counihan is enjoying life away from the intense pressures of the inter-county stage — but he’s still being kept busy

I’m busy enough,” says Conor Counihan when he answers your call.

“Busy reading your colleague, Pat Keane. Trying to work out if any of these tips are any good. But sure come up if you like.”

It’s over a month since Counihan stepped down as Cork senior football manager. He resigned just after his team was beaten by Dublin, who play in tomorrow’s All-Ireland football final, and the Aghada man gave a farewell to the press in keeping with his reign: dignified and articulate.

Now he’s back at his day job in Charleville, near the Cork-Limerick border, where he’s chief executive of St Joseph’s Foundation, which helps people with disabilities.

He’s not joking about being busy; it’s just that he knows he could be a lot busier.

“People would say to me ‘sure you wouldn’t be under pressure this time of the year anyway unless ye were in an All-Ireland final’. It doesn’t work like that, though.

“The reality is that when you’re an inter-county manager, you’re never off the clock. You’re always looking for something.

“You read the paper and a rugby coach says something about preparation of training that catches your eye — you say to yourself, ‘I’d better follow that up’.

“It’s 24-7, but it’s the same for every inter-county coach. In fact, forget about inter-county — it’s the same for every club coach at this stage. Fair enough, when you’re not over a team, you don’t have that... buzzing all the time, that constant looking out for things that you can bring in.

“Early on, for instance, I noticed some managers were in the stands for games and I tried that for a while. You’re always watching. Always reading. Is this warm-up better? Is that approach good?

“You mightn’t make a huge change, now — it might be only a tweak that you’d introduce, but it could help.”

The reverse can happen: a manager can be flooded with information, he says.

“I wouldn’t be a big man for YouTube, say, but you’d have enough people on board that would be, and you’d have to allocate it — ‘you chase that up’ — and that’s their job.

“See, you also have to maintain control. There’s only so much you can look at, and only so much of that has value anyway. You could meet a guy on every corner of the street with a point of view or something to offer, but not all of that would be useful.”

In his farewell press conference, Counihan made a strong plea for more balance in Gaelic games coverage. He still feels strongly about the subject: “I just think we fall into the trap of comparing Gaelic footballers, GAA players, with the Premier League almost unconsciously. It’s not the same because they’re not being paid vast amounts of money to insulate them from criticism that’s over the top.

“More to the point, though, there are 32 counties, and not all of them are in a position to compete, but they’re all putting in the same sacrifices.

“And the criticism — people forget some of these players are youngsters. They’re impressionable kids. You hear the argument that they’re putting themselves out there for a flogging, but I think people have to be realistic in their criticism. To be balanced.

“That’s not about going easy on me or whatever. I got on well with the media, I thought, but that’s because I felt I could have a bit of craic with people. You must be able to do that as well — you couldn’t get altogether too serious about it, either. If you don’t get some enjoyment out of it, then what are you at?”

Over the course of the talk, Counihan returns again and again to that theme — context and perspective. The St Joseph’s Foundation mission statement declares its intention to provide people with disabilities the opportunity to live the life of their choice to their fullest potential. Is working in that environment something that strengthens the sense of perspective?

“It does put things in context, in that it shows you what’s worth worrying about.

“If you have a child with serious disabilities or needs, then that’s a challenge you face as a parent every day of the week.

“Playing football or managing a team is a huge commitment and one you put everything into, but you can park it at times. A child’s needs are seven days a week. There’s no close season involved.”

When they won the All-Ireland he brought the Sam Maguire out to the foundation along with Michael Shields and Donncha O’Connor.

The welcome was a special one.

“Ah yeah, everyone in the place is mad about sport, and they all got a great kick out of that day. It was fantastic.”

Still, that single All-Ireland is the knock against his reputation. Some commentators were loud in their criticism, saying with the talent at their disposal Cork should have won more senior titles.

“If it was an U14 team you had and they won three championships, you’d want them to win four,” he says.

“That’s natural. You’d say to yourself, ‘well, if this happened or that happened we might have won more’, but only to a point.

“You can’t go through life like that. You have to move on, too; you can’t be beating yourself up all the time.”

Still, he did the ‘Coach’s Couch’ interview for this newspaper last year and referred to his regrets over an U14 county final he lost himself...

“Ah yeah, but I was a young fella then. I learned!

“Obviously over the years you’d have had games that hurt, defeats that hurt, but you move on. You have to.

“A big regret? I thought we did well against Donegal last year. I thought we were well in it before we left them back into the game.

“There was no doubt they were the better team on the day by the end of it, but we’d set ourselves up right early on, we just didn’t push on. Why didn’t we keep going the way we did early on? I don’t know.

“But credit to Donegal, too. They were good last year. They deserved an All-Ireland.”

That’s magnanimous. Is he a good loser, then?

“No. Not at all. After a defeat, when I’d get home, say, there’d be picture but no sound. I wouldn’t take a loss well.

“I don’t miss that now that I’m out of it, the disappointment of losing. Take the hurling final — Jimmy (Barry-Murphy) is on the line and the All-Ireland’s nearly there, then bang. Draw.

“That’s sport at the top level. The disappointment is huge. And the anti-climax... you’re building for the day all your life, never mind the few weeks, or even the season. The All-Ireland.

“But you know it’ll be all over on the day, so you think, and then a draw means you’re down, and you have to get back up again.

“That’s a huge demand, and it’s the same for Davy Fitzgerald, and all the players, too.

“What people maybe miss is that you can never allow yourself the luxury of getting too upset in front of the players, because that only adds to their anxiety in a situation that’s high-pressure enough as it is.”

On the other hand, while winning the All-Ireland was an obvious highlight, he doesn’t cherish the day or the performance as much as the experience of the group. The strength of the bond.

“There was huge focus there, huge spirit, the way everyone committed to it. Nothing was too much effort for any of the people involved.

“There was great camaraderie in the group and I could see that continuing. There were groups I’d have played with and there’d be certain friendships alright, but it wouldn’t be as strong — as a group — as existed with that group. Respect, I suppose, was the key factor.”

Well, he’s mentioned his playing days. Before his incarnation as an affable sideline presence, Counihan was an unyielding centre-back.

It wasn’t that long ago — he played in an All-Ireland final 25 ago, after all — but does inter-county football then seem like a different life?

“Oh, it does. Completely. The demands now aren’t comparable at all. I remember coming home from league matches that time, in the 80s, and you wouldn’t be in any hurry back to Cork, put it that way.

“Nowadays, though...”

So if a couple of the Cork U21s had said on an NFL trip to Ballybofey, for instance, ‘We’ll make our own way home, we might stay on for a night or two’, how would that have been received?

“It might have happened!” he says.

“Seriously, though, I’d have been surprised if that had come up, which in itself raises the question, ‘is it all gone too far the other way?’

“Sorting out the balance there, between the preparation and lads enjoying themselves, that would be very difficult. And it’s not something you’d experiment with as a manager, when you’re there anyway.

“My own time playing, though, that’d come under ‘time to move on’ as well. You’d want to be able to move on. I wouldn’t see the Meath fellas we played against only the odd time, and when I do there’s no problem, you’d have the craic with them. Certainly it’s not a case of worrying over goals that should have been scored, frees you conceded, anything like that. You couldn’t live that way.”

There’ll be no more ringing other managers now. The way he paints the picture, there’s more communication among the men in the bainisteoir bibs than you’d think.

“Depending on the relationship, historically, you’d ring and ask some of them about your opponents, sure.

“I wouldn’t mind saying I’d ring a couple of them that might have some insight into the opposition you wouldn’t have yourself, particularly if you got on well with them.

“I found most of them solid enough. You’re all in the same business, after all.”

With the weekend that’s in it, then...

“Jim Gavin and James Horan are two good managers, though very different in their approach and in what they’ve had to do in their respective counties.

“Horan, to be fair to him, has brought consistency to Mayo in the last couple of years — and he’s brought a bit of an edge to them. He’s kept them at the top for a couple of years, which isn’t easy in a county like that, which has been the bridesmaid so often.

“The disappointment that repeated defeats instils in players makes it hard to build consistency within them as a group, so you’d have to give him credit for that. It’s a bigger achievement than it might seem from the outside.”

And the Dublin boss?

“For Jim Gavin, to come in, win a national league and make it to an All-Ireland final in his first year, while also changing individuals and bringing through a certain style of play, that’s a huge achievement as well. Add in the fact that there’s also a huge media pressure on Dublin because they’re in the capital city. He’s managed that very well also.

“It’s no accident to see the two of them making it to the All-Ireland final. Call it? Dublin have a lot on the bench, they’ve got pace... Mayo need Cillian O’Connor and Andy Moran to be fully fit, and I don’t know if they are.”

Where would you put your money?

“If it was your money, I’d put it on Dublin.”

He usually goes up on a Saturday and drops into the Burlington (“You’d always meet a few lads there for a chat,”) but he might just head up and down on the day tomorrow.

The day of the Dublin game he was asked if he’d manage at the top level again, and he said never say never.

“You’d learn that much from life, but I’m happy enough where I am.”

Happy. Busy. Close enough with the tips, though.