Fintan Goold setting goals again
Little over three months have passed since the Cork footballer pulled up 18 minutes into the first half of the Munster inter-firms decider in Killarney complaining of a calf injury.
The longer than expected rehab process, lengthened by his own admission that he didn’t do a whole pile to address the injury over the Christmas period, has him frustrated and he’s beginning to question if his entire 2016 season will be spent on the sideline.
From not pushing at all to pushing too much, this niggle in his calf simply refuses to subside.
An engineer with Eli Lilly in Dunderrow, the Cork forward sat out the McGrath Cup campaign and didn’t tog for the opening four games of the Allianz league.
The more important weekends of the GAA calendar remain well in the distance, but he’s conscious there’s a new management team to impress and the fact that his 20s draw to a close at the end of April.
So, while he’d rather be out building a case for selection come championship, Goold has been confined to stats duty, jotting down the number of assists made by newcomers Luke Connolly and Peter Kelleher.
Hardly ideal.
The end of March brings a tunnel, some light and a return to light training. Relief. Rounds five and six of the league are done and dusted by this juncture.
Not to worry, there’s still one remaining spring assignment. Cork head to Tralee to preserve their Division 1 status on the first Sunday of April and Goold is included in the match-day squad.
The seven minutes he’s afforded off the bench allow him to turn the page on a particularly frustrating couple of months, even if it also closes the book on Cork’s residency in the top flight.
Now Goold is sharp, fresh and looking forward to championship. He’s positive about the summer ahead, perspective gained from a spring spent on team physio Brian O’Connell’s table.
“I haven’t had an injury for that long and it was frustrating, especially as you get older, you’re probably precious for every year you have. I was thinking there around March, ‘Jaysus, is this going to drag on for the whole season?’ I came back in January and I couldn’t get it right for a couple of months, it just took an awful long time.
“The actual first game of football I played was the first round of the county championship with Macroom against Fermoy [in late April], and I hadn’t played a full match since Macroom were knocked out by Éire Óg at the end of August last year.
"It was a long spell out for something that felt innocuous at the start, but thankfully I got a week training in Portugal under my belt and I played a senior championship game with Muskerry and a number of internal games with Cork.
“It’s better to be right for this time of the year than the other way round. It’s important to look at the positives, maybe I’ll be a bit fresher coming into the summer. It’s not what I would have planned, but it was what it was.”
Tipperary are first up today as Cork chase redemption on the field where their 2015 championship came to a grinding end. Goold, now in his 12th season with the Cork panel, describes the defeat as degrading and humiliating.
He was introduced as a 21st-minute sub for the injured Alan O’Connor, the third game last summer where he was sprung off the bench — the drawn Munster final was the sole fixture where Brian Cuthbert included him on the starting 15.
The poison arrows followed the eight-point whipping by Kildare. The hurlers were subject to similar condemnation following their defeat to Tipperary last month and Goold points out that “across the country, the level of commitment and dedication [from players] has gone up and the level of criticism and scrutiny has gone up with it”.
He continues: “The Kildare defeat left a very sour taste in the mouth. It was very unfortunate for Brian [Cuthbert] and the lads that that’s how it had to finish up for them. Personally, as well, we didn’t want to finish on a note like that. I didn’t want that to be my last involvement with Cork.
“[Outside criticism] makes it more and more difficult for amateur players. You’re asking an awful lot of guys and at the same time they’re shipping a lot of flak. At the end of the day, there’ll only be one winner at the end of the season but everyone else then is seen as a failure.
“You have to set your own goals as a team as to what you want out of a season and what you consider a success. For us, starting on Sunday, it’s Tipperary and we’ve no right to look beyond that because, truth be told, we stole a game off them two years ago and their underage players have beaten Cork so I don’t think they’re going to fear us.”
