Christy Ring the selector: Frank Murphy on his hurling brain and team talks

Frank Murphy worked alongside Ring as a Cork selector but his appreciation of the Glen legend was already laminated at that stage. 'You really had to see him play to appreciate him,' he says 

Happy Cork men on the train home from the 1976 All-Ireland final win over Wexford. From left: Denis Murphy (Selector), Fr. Bertie Troy (Coach), Frank Murphy (Selector), Ray Cummins (Captain), Jimmy Brohan (Selector), and Christy Ring (Selector).

Christy Ring was a Cork hurling selector in 1973 when Cork lost to Tipperary by 5–4 to 1–10 in the Munster Championship semi-final. 

Later that year a new selection committee was elected. Both Ring and Fr. Bertie Troy were not re-appointed Two years later Blackrock won the Cork county championship. The club requested the County Board that it be given an opportunity to appoint the Cork selection committee. The Board granted Blackrock their request.

Blackrock invited Jimmy Brohan (Blackrock), Denis Hurley (Sarsfields), Denis Murphy (St Finbarrs), Frank Murphy (County Secretary and Blackrock) and Christy Ring to be the selectors. All accepted. Once appointed the selectors asked Fr Bertie Troy to serve as coach a glorious era of Cork hurling began.

Frank Murphy was still relatively new to the role of County Secretary in 1975.

“1975 was my first time working with Christy on a selection committee.” he says now. “Christy had been a selector in 1973 and I dealt with him then as the secretary of the Board.” 

The inter-county scene was very different then to what it is now. The National League was not the competition it has now become.

“There were league games played before Christmas”, Murphy said, “but there was very little emphasis put on collective training during the winter. All the games were taken on their merits. As selectors might experiment with an individual, or try out a player in the league. Once the league was over, the focus would quickly turn to the championship.

“Christy had an amazing hurling brain. He was always looking for an edge in these league games. Maybe not to win a particular game, but to find something that we could use later on in championship.” 

Murphy related a story from 1975 to emphasise the point. “We played Wexford, in Wexford, before Christmas. Late in the game, Tony Doran lost his hurley and ran the best part of dozen steps before passing the ball into the net. Even the Wexford crowd didn’t shout because they expected the goal to be disallowed. It wasn’t.” 

The story does not end there. The incident came back to haunt Wexford in the Championship. Murphy explained. “It transpired the same referee was appointed to take charge of the All-Ireland final between Cork and Wexford nine months later. Christy spoke to the team on the week of the All-Ireland final, making his point in an unusual way."

According to Murphy, Ring began by asking Gerald McCarthy, ‘Gerald, do rugby shorts have pockets?’.

“Gerald replied: ‘They do Christy’.

“To which Christy responded, ‘Maybe we should all wear rugby shorts so on Sunday. Because when we get the ball, we can run with it in our pocket. We know now that the referee won’t blow for a foul’.” 

Murphy says Ray Cummins went on to score a goal in the final where he took a dozen steps and kicked the ball to the net. Cork went on to win the game. After the match, Ring was one of the last people to enter the dressing room and made directly for Ray Cummins.

‘Did you remember the shorts?’ he asked the Cummins.

To which Cummins replied, “I knew I had taken too many steps and I was about to drop the ball when I remembered what you said, so I took a few more before I kicked it to the net.”

'Ha!’ said Ring. ‘I knew it’, giving Cummins a slap on the back as hard as any that he received during the championship.

One wonders did Christy Ring draw on his experiences as a player to help the team? 

“He rarely spoke about himself without a purpose”, Murphy said. 

He was never one to talk about his own games, but he would occasionally draw on his own experiences to make a point. Ring once addressed the Cork team before an important game emphasising that the players would have to take their opportunities.

‘If the chances don’t come, you have to take the half chance. And if that doesn’t come you have to make your own chance’, he said.

“He followed this up with an account of his famous goal in the 1946 All-Ireland final.” 

‘There was no chance coming and no half-chance coming either. So I moved to centre-forward and asked Paddy “Hitler” Healy, who was playing midfield, to lean on his opponent from the next Cork puck-out to allow the ball run through to me’.

Hitler did as he was told.

“‘I got the ball and headed for goal and the next thing I saw was a shower of rain water falling off the net’.” 

Murphy said that Ring was very quick witted and had had an answer for everything. “After we won the All-Ireland final in 1978 against Kilkenny, a Clare man, who Christy knew, said to him, ‘Cork were poor enough today, if ye were playing Clare ye would have lost.’ 

Christy immediately quipped back, ‘If we were playing Clare, we wouldn’t have played like that!’.” 

Murphy feels very privileged to have known and worked with Christy Ring.

“He was an incredible person” he said. “He was great company and not just during the years we were selectors. He was an amazing hurler. From the time I saw him first with Cork and with Glen Rovers, I never saw anyone to display such array of skills on the field; he really had to be seen to be appreciated. Nobody could do what Ring did, he was undoubtedly the best.”

- You can purchase the Irish Examiner's 20-page special publication to mark the centenary of Christy Ring's birth with your Friday edition of the Irish Examiner in stores or from our epaper site.