Cadogan: Cork woes can’t be put down to dual commitments
In both cases, his friend Dónal Óg Cusack has let his feelings be known. On last weekend’s The Sunday Game, in the wake of Cork’s 10-point loss to Tipperary, Cusack addressed the dual playing issue for a fourth show this summer, when he said the romance of it was now dead.
In relation to Aidan Walsh, Cusack said: “An incredible credit due to the man to take on two such demanding sports, but I think after today — and I’ve said a lot of times, and it doesn’t give me pleasure saying it — you can’t be playing at the highest level in one sport whilst you’re only giving a maximum of maybe 70% or 80% of your time to it.” He’s never mentioned Cadogan but what Cusack uttered on TV, the former Cork goalkeeper has said to his face. The pair have had “plenty of arguments” on the matter, according to the Douglas man, speaking at yesterday’s adidas Predator Incurza Kicking Masterclass.
But Cusack has said nothing to change his pal’s mind: “I’m burnt out from talking about, it’s just the easiest thing to jump on now at this stage. Could you say that everyone on the Cork team last Sunday played well? No, you couldn’t. We were probably beaten in too many areas of the field.
“Can you blame the dual players for that? I don’t think you can. I just think it’s an easy outlet to go, ‘dual-players are the problem here’ automatically.
“I think you have to take collective ownership throughout the whole panel.”
For each point Cusack has made, Cadogan has fired one back at him. “We had a conversation recently where he was saying if you focus on one thing completely, then you can only get better at it. He probably does have a point but I keep saying to him then why are fellas that are playing both codes and maybe only there 50% of the time getting their game? Is that not a credit to the guys that are there, to say they can compete at the highest level when only splitting their time 50-50?”
Only days after his inter-county summer finished, Cadogan won’t be tying himself to split commitments again next year.
That doesn’t mean his dual playing is finished for the season. On Sunday, there’s senior football championship with Douglas, shortly followed by preparations for the hurling campaign.
“We’ve between six and nine dual players on our football team who will go into hurling training on Tuesday night and prepare for a senior championship game against county champions Midleton.
“ No one thinks ‘the dual players can’t be doing it,’ we’re just banged out and that’s the case and get on with it. It can be a good thing sometimes.”
He has his thoughts on Cusack’s Páirc Uí Chaoimh and underage development comments and appears to agree with some of them but doesn’t go so far as to actually back them.
“I’m not going to get dragged into that... at this moment I’m a player and my job is to play.
“If we are to look at who is setting the bar right now, you’d have to look at the likes of Dublin, both on and off the field, with their underage structures and their success as well. It’s shining through really, they are U21 champions again this year in football and then their senior footballers. I don’t think there is anyone can see anything but an upset beating them this year.”
As for five-week break between Cork’s Munster final success and All-Ireland semi-final failure, Cadogan wonders just who listens to players when they highlight flaws in competition structures.
“I don’t even think about the structures, I just go out and play. If you’re told five weeks, it’s five weeks and you get on with it.
“Do the players really have any say on what happens with the structures anyway? No, the GPA are trying to encourage players to have a bit of a say to see what their preference is and that’s great.
“Is it actually listened to at the top end or on the business side of things? I don’t know if it is.”
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