John Corcoran ‘was one in a million’
Corcoran, who died suddenly during the week, was chatting to the team medic when his phone rang. It was this newspaper, looking for results from his home division of Carbery.
Without hesitating, Corcoran reeled off precise results in “20-odd” games at various grades, estimates Murphy. No notes. No consultation.
“I asked him after he hung up if he’d been making them up as he went along,” says Murphy.
“Not at all. They were all correct. Amazing. I never saw anything like it.”
The obvious description of Corcoran, who topped out well over six feet and was built to match, was a gentle giant. Hidden depths would be better, though.
Corcoran managed the Carbery side that won the Cork senior football championship in 2004, was a Cork senior football selector from 2005 to 2007 and was a selector on the UCC Sigerson-winning teams of 2011 and 2014.
He held various positions in his club, St Mary’s, with the Carbery board, was secretary of Comhairle Ardoideachais and college delegate to the Munster Council, as well as refereeing in the Carbery division.
His reputation always preceded him. Alan Quirke would share a Cork senior dressing-room with Corcoran, but even as a kid in school Quirke heard stories from the St Mary’s lads in the class about the larger-than-life figure in their club.
“He came in as a selector with Billy Morgan and was very good to read a game,” says Quirke.
“The other strong point he had was he attended so many games all over the county, particularly in west Cork.
“Because of that he had an in-depth knowledge of players in the club scene, from junior B all the way up to senior.
"Back then himself and Ger O’Sullivan from Dromtarriffe would have been looking at the likes of Donncha O’Connor and Sean Levis, guys from smaller clubs. That would have been a big strength of theirs.
“Billy (Morgan) would be soft-spoken, generally, while John was boisterous and slagging lads, hopping off people — so the chemistry between them was good.”
The jovial west Cork man was also a boon to journalists.
At press events he was accommodating, articulate and talkative: This writer saw him once, in Páirc Uí Rinn, fielding questions about an upcoming Cork game.
In among the inquiries about injuries and commitment detonated a question in Irish, but Corcoran returned fire in the same language without pausing for breath.
He duly answered the next question, asked in English, before inhaling.
On another occasion this writer picked up the phone to ask him, in his capacity as a Carbery officer, about a prominent GAA personality who was reportedly facing a suspension, only to beg for mercy after 10 minutes of Corcoran quoting the rule book at considerable, and no doubt accurate, length: “ . . . if that individual chooses to appeal, and I am in no way saying that he is bound to be found guilty of the particular offence he stands-”
“John, stop. I give up. Is there anything else we can talk about?”
“When are you winning that Pulitzer?”
Corcoran’s outgoing nature wasn’t the only side to him, noted Quirke.
“He was very intelligent, and very philosophical. If you won he wouldn’t get too carried away, while if you didn’t win a game, or didn’t play too well, he’d look at in impartial terms — ‘look, this is what happened, this is why it happened, we’ll improve here, let’s move it on now’.
“Because he was an administrator from a young age — and a referee, of course — people probably associated him with that, but because he just took in so many games he had an encyclopaedic knowledge of football and footballers.”
It wasn’t all serious. Quirke can remember he and his team-mates going for dinner after a game down in Killarney, and Corcoran exploiting the empty chair next to him at the table.
The waitress was told the chair’s occupant had just stepped out, but sure leave his dinner there for him ...
“He gave us a wink,” says Quirke.
“Banished the second dinner. I remember a bit of an inquisition among the officials about the extra meal, but John was nowhere to be found when the questions were asked.”
When he stepped down as a Cork senior football selector it wasn’t long before another Leeside institution came knocking on his door — his alma mater.
“When Billy (Morgan), John Grainger (UCC games development officer) and I invited him to join UCC in 2009, we knew what we were getting,” says Dr Con Murphy.
“A shrewd judge of players, a great administrator — which we weren’t — and that he was great fun. He never got excited on the line and didn’t say too much there, but when he did you listened.”
Quirke, who had left the Army to join UCC’s Department of Sport and Physical Activity, saw his old friend from the Cork seniors as a huge addition to the College.
“He knew football, knew the players — had his opinions and gave them frankly — and the College got the benefit of his football brain, certainly.”
Murphy adds: “More than anything, he was great company.
"The players loved him, and he was just the man to stir up plenty of banter between Cork and Kerry lads on the UCC panel.
"To us he was one in a million. He’d have enjoyed the tributes being paid to him, no doubt about that! He’ll be sorely missed.”
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