No social media, no fear, no playing it down: Ben O’Connor speaks his mind
REBEL LEADER: Cork Manager Ben O'Connor. Pic: Natasha Barton/Inpho
21 minutes with Ben O’Connor. 21 minutes of flowing Cork frankness. Difficult to know where to start. So many standout remarks. No question shirked. Forthright and unfiltered replies from first utterance to last.
To give you a flavour of the conversation, here’s a collection of snippets from the new Cork hurling manager.
On the expectation that comes with the gig: “I'm not on social media and I don't read papers. I know there's noise going on in the background, and I know there are people commenting. But as for expectation, where else would you want to be?”
On the 2025 All-Ireland final hammering and the mood that result has fed among players: “We weren't involved. That's all done and dusted. We're looking forward.”
On that mindset of parking the past and being exclusively concerned with what’s in front of you: “I had plenty of bad days and it didn't bother me. My mother was above in the stand, and fellas would be alongside her roaring in abuse. They didn't know who she was, and they were roaring in abuse, 'That useless...' and that wouldn't bother me. That’s the way all them fellas are as well.”
On ending the Cork famine during his tenure: “I want to win all our Munster Championship matches, all our league matches, the semi-final and the All-Ireland final. What's the point in me playing it down?”
On maintaining an element of fun in a dressing-room drenched in pressure: “You can't be a dictator.”
On employing a sweeper: “I have no problem with it. We'll know how to play with it and we'll hopefully know how to play against it.”
On the style of play he hopes to oversee: “I like good hurlers, but I'd like to think that when a bit of fight and a bit of dirt would have to be around, I wouldn't shy away from that when I was playing myself and I hope the players I have picked are the same.”
See what I mean by flowing frankness. There was wit in there too.
The handing out of competitive debuts begins this weekend. Ben regaled us with the brilliant story of his own debut.
It was April 1999. Himself, twin brother Jerry, and a Newtownshandrum neighbour were heading across to see Arsenal. The then 20-year-old never got to Highbury. The weekend instead involved 20 League minutes in Gorey and a post-match pint with management.
“It was Cork selector Fred Sheedy who rang my oul fella the day before the game. There were no mobiles, so it was the landline he rang at home. My oul fella said to me, 'you won't be playing but go off for the drive'. So I cancelled the trip and the lads went off to Highbury,” Ben recalled.
“I went up to Gorey and got 20 minutes, so it was well worth going. Things kicked off from there after.
“The field is way up at the top of the town, so Fred and I were walking down afterwards to the hotel and we were in early. Fred said, 'we'll have a drink', and I was saying, 'what do I say here now?' So I said I'd have a pint bottle and Fred said, 'no bother at all'. A pint bottle of cider with one of the selectors after your first league game, it wouldn't happen these days, but I suppose that's a sign of the times moving on.”
Times have indeed moved on. But when you’re taking over a team that has lost the two most recent All-Ireland finals in wildly contrasting circumstances, in a county ravenous for reacquaintance with Liam MacCarthy, there has to be some element of enjoyment mixed into the weekly proceedings.
“I know there's a pressure that comes with playing for Cork but we're trying to make it as enjoyable as possible. You can't be a dictator,” Ben continued.
A dictator, no, but he has vowed to be a “tough taskmaster” who’ll demand of his charges. And so for “vibrancy” and “positivity”, he has turned to performance psychologist Gerry Hussey.
There was no prior relationship between the pair. Ben simply had an awareness of what Hussey had done within the Irish boxing set-up and other GAA teams. There’s acknowledgement too that more needs to be right than just a player’s touch and conditioning.
“It's a big part of today's game. He'll have a chat with them because there are lots of things going on in fellas' lives.”
We didn’t need 21 minutes to learn that Ben is unperturbed by any baggage he may have inherited and equally unperturbed by the inevitable criticism that will come from “ignorant cábógs” if the biggest prize isn’t delivered.
Whether each of his players are cut from the same cloth will be further scrutinised in the weeks and months ahead.
“It's very easy for a fella above [in the stand] that couldn't bless himself and he roaring and shouting about a fella, 'what's he doing inside there?'
“There will be people who'll tell you that's an awful way to be, to not be worried about the general public. Well, we are. The decent hurling people, we want to go out and win matches for them.
"But at the end of the day, it's about what happens inside the group. We're trying to keep it nice and tight and we're trying to keep every fella confident.”
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