Noel Connors: ‘Negativity’ jibe won’t upset Waterford

Waterford will happily pick up more critics for their style of play if it means they advance on their excellent 2015 season, insists Noel Connors.

The Déise had more than their fair share of brickbats this past season: former Kilkenny defender Eddie O’Connor claimed they were largely to blame for a forgettable hurling year.

Connors is aware of the expectancy on Derek McGrath to make Waterford more offensive over the coming months. For one, many anticipate Austin Gleeson will move into the half-forward line while the return of Pauric Mahony from injury and the further development of Patrick Curran and the Bennett brothers, Stephen and Shane, will add extra dimensions to the attack.

But Connors maintains McGrath won’t be pushed into adopting a more aesthetically pleasing style if it lessens Waterford’s chances of winning games. “Absolutely not,” says the Passage man, speaking on the GAA-GPA Opel All-Stars trip in Austin, Texas.

“I think you’re going to adapt your game to every different situation and depending on who you are playing it’s going to be different.

“And I think that for the last couple of years we were probably missing someone like John Mullane to light up the full forward line but we had a great target man last year in Maurice Shanahan. And you’re looking now at the likes of Patrick Curran and a few younger lads to kick on and put their hands up.

“It wouldn’t surprise me at all (if Waterford adopt the same tactics as 2015) but whether Derek has numerous scenarios going on in his head... you know the way Derek is, particularly in the forwards where they are real natural kind of poachers, because at times last year (2015) we were kind of manufacturing people into positions.

“But I think with the fantastic amount of development training that has been done at underage level in Waterford that the natural hurlers are really coming out now. And I suppose Tadhg de Búrca is a perfect example of that.”

The chatter about Waterford’s so-called negativity never upset Connors largely because he ignored it. “To be honest, you don’t hear or think about it you just go out and play, and do what you have to do to win. And that’s probably a cliché when it comes to sport but you do - because you’re training so much and because you’re ambitious you’ll do what you have to do - and if that’s changing your style to accommodate what you have or if that’s trying to change your style to nullify someone in the opposition that’s what you do.

“I suppose that’s been done for years in every other sport and it’s becoming more recognised now in the GAA. And I think that’ll be something that’s going to continue in the GAA.

“Even if you look at Clare the year they won it, they were very much like that as well with Shane O’Donnell in at full-forward on his own. So going back to that situation it’s just that that’s the way the GAA is going because people are getting stronger faster and fitter, you can get up and down the field a lot more and so on.”

Connors appreciates 2015 was a success in contrast to Waterford’s previous season but a league title and Munster final and All-Ireland semi-final appearances don’t carry too much water with him. “We’re not happy with where we ended up last year. Your objective is to win everything. That might sound strange and a bit over the top but that’s why you train for months on end. You want to be ambitious, win every match.”

A provincial final is not something Wexford have featured in 2008 but at least Lee Chin and the Wexford hurlers will end one famine when they appear in Croke Park next year ending an eight-year break.

Chin accepts Wexford are on hurling’s third tier – he places Kilkenny on the top shelf followed by Tipperary and Galway “and one or two others” on the second level – and wants to play in GAA HQ on merit.

“Winning Leinster would be huge for us. Wexford haven’t won it since 2004 - a very long time. It’s nine (sic) years since we were in Croke Park. It’s hard to take that; that you your own county haven’t been in Croke Park for so long. We’ll be there next year playing Dublin in the first round. It’s almost like you’re cheating the system. I always thought I’d get of chances to play with Wexford in Croke Park on a day we deserved to be there, in a Leinster final or whatever.”

One thing’s for certain: Chin won’t be lining out for the county footballers any time soon. “At this moment, I can’t see myself ever doing it again. I’m happy enough to keep tapping away with the club but not county. I never got the same pleasure out of playing football as hurling. However, I enjoyed my time in football... Jason Ryan brought a whole new level of professionalism into it - that appealed to me as young player. I’m happy that I gave it a go because it gave me a sense of what I wanted to do.

“It’s hard enough trying to play the likes of Kilkenny when you’re concentrating on hurling only but it you try to combine it with football, it’s never going to work. That’s the way I see it. I knew when I left it in 2014 that I wouldn’t be going back to it. I never played too much underage football. It was mostly hurling but I wanted to give football a go with Jason.

“I loved every minute of the football under Jason but you can’t keep the two going at the level that’s needed nowadays. I thought I could do both - mentally and physically - but it didn’t really work out. I know I’ve made the right choice to stick with hurling.”