McCarthy admits he does not have backing of Cork hurlers

[Reillers]

Festering paranoia pitches Cork into deep crisis


By Vincent Hogan

Monday November 03 2008


You would have to be profoundly dim or patronising to view the current strife in Cork as a blithe eruption of player vanity.

It may be true that this generation of Leeside hurlers has never been drawn towards the easy route to public approval. The quarrels they pick are awkward and complex. They expose themselves to uncomfortable energies and easy condemnation.

Sometimes, their intensity radiates little flickers of paranoia that are inclined to puzzle the outside world.

I remember drinking with one of their brightest minds in a bar in mid-town Manhattan during the Vodafone All Stars trip last year. We had started as a throng but, in time, just three remained. Yours truly, the Corkman and a current Kilkenny stalwart.

Back home, the Teddy Holland business had just begun to gather steam and two of us were inquisitive for the detail. Cork's Fidel Castro streak seemed to be drawing them back onto the picket line. What was the cause? Who were the culprits? How on earth could it have come to this again?

The Corkman offered us as much detail as he could without breaking any confidences. He saw the conflict as a fundamental matter of principle. A quarrel they were duty-bound to pursue.

This column argued the toss. We wondered about Cork's taste for the nuclear option at the flimsiest provocation. Their hurlers, it seemed, were easily offended and inclined to recycle that offence as a certificate for war.

Our conversation climbed to a debate without ever escalating to an argument. The Corkman laid his cards on the table. He was courteous but fierce in his beliefs. To him, there was no honour worth talking about in merely wearing a county jersey.

The honour came from winning in it.

If the subject filched our attention for half an hour, only two voices were engaged. The Kilkenny man sat in silence, his expression that of someone listening to a lottery winner carp about the price of milk. To him, Cork just seemed a foreign country.

Here, after all, was a team that -- one year earlier -- had come close to winning their third All-Ireland in-a-row. A team followed and revered by the biggest support base in hurling. A team acknowledged as having changed the game itself by dint of revolutionary preparation.

How on earth could so much have been done in a climate of such disharmony?

There is one quote in Michael Moynihan's splendid book 'Blood Brothers' that, maybe more than any other, takes us to the heart of the business now burning again like a toxic fire in Cork GAA.

It comes from Sean Og O hAilpin, one of the senior players aligned so unapologetically to the bid to have Gerald McCarthy step down as hurling manager. It relates, not to McCarthy, but to the Cork County Board.

O hAilpin is talking about negotiations during the Holland dispute and the strike that it eventually spawned. "The only sin we committed was winning," he says. "The board never talked about the previous four years when we were winning; they didn't see the last four years as successful themselves, which is an indication.

"They should have been as proud of that as anyone else, but deep down inside they didn't feel that because they weren't as involved as they wanted to be. The thing is that we didn't care who got the credit as long as Cork was successful.

"We want them to be part of it, but they saw 2002 as losing ground to the players."

The validity or otherwise of O hAilpin's view is unimportant. It is the tone of it that matters. The sense of alienation from the county board. Of believing that success on the field meant less to those who administrate in Cork than revisiting old spites.

This column's view is that the Cork players have acted unwisely in the latest dispute. Under the terms of last spring's arbitration, they themselves bought into a process that was flawed. Having two representatives on a seven-man committee never exactly looked like the keys to a bright new future.

Yet, the fury of their response to that realisation has been ill-advised and, in its treatment of Gerald McCarthy, lamentable.

The nub of the Cork crisis is not that McCarthy is a bad manager (his record declares emphatically that he isn't), but that the distance between Cork hurlers and their County Board remains the distance between the sky and the ocean.

In fact, the lack of trust that exists between the two parties now festers as open paranoia.

If you don't believe that that paranoia is pitching Cork hurling into crisis, consider this. The county has not won a minor All-Ireland since 2001, nor an U-21 since '98 -- the latter won by a team that would provide the backbone for the current seniors.

In other words, remove these players from the landscape and Cork's resources look perilously threadbare. And reading O hAilpin's comments, the board has had scant connection with the senior dressing-room in his time.

In essence, the players are of a view that they chase success in spite of their own board rather than in union with it. That is (and always has been) the worm in Cork's apple.

What may read like reckless player power is ultimately a cry of exasperation. Ill-judged and ill-articulated, no question.

But fundamentally sincere.

- Vincent Hogan

[theskull1]

I can't remember anyone every addressing themselves as the spokensperson for the GAA so I don't know WTF you are talking about. Once again a "I'll not have a bad word spoke about the players" post.

Everybody I speak to are fed up with the militancy of the players and have it in for them as they appear to be so concerned about themselves only and "their careers" rather than taking their place within the wider GAA community. I do not bow and scrape to county players huffs and nor should anyone else. Cork will be looked after by their CB better than 95% of teams in Ireland yet "they" believe they have the right to rebel against the democratic vote and then disgrace themselves as they tell the world that management inadequicies WAS the reason why "they" were not succeeding. There is obviously an issue at CB level which needs to be resolved but not at the cost of giving into such behaviour and threats from the players. I fully support any attempt by the CCB and Gerard McCarthy in their attempt to stand up to these individuals.

When are you boys going to admit that the players response to what they have seen as poor form by the CCB has been reprehensible?

If you are prepared to see that then you might understand (don't say you have to agree with it) why people have took the stance they have taken

[Reillers]

I can't remember anyone every addressing themselves as the spokensperson for the GAA so I don't know WTF you are talking about. Once again a "I'll not have a bad word spoke about the players" post.

Everybody I speak to are fed up with the militancy of the players and have it in for them as they appear to be so concerned about themselves only and "their careers" rather than taking their place within the wider GAA community. I do not bow and scrape to county players huffs and nor should anyone else. Cork will be looked after by their CB better than 95% of teams in Ireland yet "they" believe they have the right to rebel against the democratic vote and then disgrace themselves as they tell the world that management inadequicies WAS the reason why "they" were not succeeding. There is obviously an issue at CB level which needs to be resolved but not at the cost of giving into such behaviour and threats from the players. I fully support any attempt by the CCB and Gerard McCarthy in their attempt to stand up to these individuals.

When are you boys going to admit that the players response to what they have seen as poor form by the CCB has been reprehensible?

If you are prepared to see that then you might understand (don't say you have to agree with it) why people have took the stance they have taken

That sentance right there sums up your lack of knowledge about Cork hurling and highlights how clueless you are and your real agenda, because that's the biggest load of bull I've read.
Any true hurling fan could never suppoirt the board if they had any shaddow of a clue.

At least I know now and wont bother replying or fighting what are posts just to whinge about players when you have zero facts or knowledge or history, nothing I mean nothing. That sentence..unbelievable.

You claim they are treated better by 95% of the teams in the country.
Oh right..
Take a read of this,

Murphy has most questions to answer in Rebel row

Sunday November 02 2008

Gerald McCarthy has been fighting his corner, the players have been fighting their corner too, but the man with the most questions to answer has once again gone to ground.

If Frank Murphy were the chief executive of a company, and if his staff went on strike three times in six years, Murphy would be sacked. Negotiations might solve the problem once or twice but when these agreements break down repeatedly it finally becomes obvious that they are only papering over the reality: that the trust between boss and staff has broken down irretrievably.

Disputes are rarely black and white but when staff repeatedly withdraw their labour it is a reliable indicator of management failure. There may be a problem at the bottom but there's a bigger problem at the top. So eventually you replace the boss with a new face and the promise of a fresh start for everyone.

Relations between Murphy and the Cork county footballers and hurlers were so dysfunctional at the end of last year that Croke Park took the unprecedented step of asking an expert in industrial disputes to intervene. Kieran Mulvey, chief executive of the Labour Relations Commission, eventually patched together a deal.

And now the two sides are at war again. If it wasn't obvious already, it is obvious now: Murphy is incapable of winning the trust of these players. When it comes to player relations, the secretary of the Cork County Board has the worst record in the history of the GAA. Other teams in other counties have taken strike action over the years. But they were all one-off disputes. No other secretary or chairman of a county board has presided over three strikes by the county's flagship team. No other secretary or chairman has been more divisive or alienated more players over more issues than Frank Murphy.

Irrespective of the rights and wrongs of this latest debacle, it is a fact that Murphy has been central to three strike actions by his hurlers, and one strike action by his footballers. It is a record that damns him. And if he's not ashamed by it he should at least be embarrassed by it.

But, his supporters might ask, what about the players? Fair enough. Let's address their record too. When they went on strike in December 2002 they had a long list of grievances: expenses, meals, playing gear, tickets, training facilities were all inadequate. Taken together, these issues amounted to a culture of disrespect over which Murphy had presided. There was the infamous 600-mile round trip to Derry in a coach that began on a Friday evening and ended with Niall McCarthy nursing a badly wounded face all the way home in the early hours of Sunday morning. Two years earlier the team had been flown to Derry.

There was the championship match against Limerick in 2001 at Páirc Uí Chaoimh where the Cork players found their dressing room occupied and were forced to tog out in the gym. The gym had no toilets; if they wanted to use the public toilets they would have to battle through the crowds milling outside -- they ended up urinating in a corner of the gym.

And when they took these issues to Murphy at a couple of meetings in the winter of 2002, they were met with hostility and a refusal to compromise. It was then, and then only, that they resorted to strike action. Murphy subsequently capitulated on just about every demand. But it took a strike by his players before he would concede the conditions that were standard in just about every other county.

His position should have been untenable then: not just because of his handling of their grievances, but because of his feudal treatment of them in the first place.

One of the concessions they won in 2002 was also standard practice elsewhere: that the manager of the team would get to choose his own selectors. Five years later, when Billy Morgan was dumped and Teddy Holland parachuted into the football manager's job, it was another confrontational act. Holland was a puppet in a bigger battle: he patently wasn't the right man for the job and the footballers were not going to stand for it. In another deliberately provocative move, it was also decided that Holland would not have the right to pick his own selectors.

It was an attempt to claw back a piece of what he'd conceded in 2002. The hurlers knew it and they joined the footballers in a strike that dragged on for months.

Eventually Murphy was forced to sack Holland before the mess was sorted out, with the help of Mulvey, last February. Eight months later the truce has broken down again.

Frank Murphy has been the fulltime administrator of Cork GAA for over 30 years. He has never divulged his salary. And despite the shambles of 2002, 2007/08 and October 2008, he has never explained and never apologised.

The players have been taking plenty of flak this week, some of it from Gerald McCarthy. The reality however is that it is Murphy, more than anyone, who wants rid of the so-called trouble-makers in this Cork team. But it's McCarthy who's in the public firing line while Murphy, once again, has gone into hiding. The secretary, of course, does his best work behind closed doors.

There are a lot of questions surrounding the latest impasse but there is one, more than any, that needs to be answered by people in Cork: why is this man still in charge?


Now please tell me a team that is treated like this, worse then this because if 95% of teams are getting treated like this then we should all stop now. Stop talking threw your hole and except what's really going on here, not your personal whinged edited version of it.

This isn't about loosing to bloody Kilkenny and this isn't about Gerald himself, they are fighting for the good of Cork hurling, more and more about the board is being made puble and slowly but surely people are beggining to realise that the players/and McCarthy aren't the big bad guys that everyone thinks they are.

You'd know that if you read and took into account one or two of the articles, but because it doesn't support your view point you don't and wont.
Any other board would be on their knees begging at this stage to fix it, to get both sides together, and fix this crisis, but no, not at all, Murphy's on holidays (never around when he's needed, shock horror) the board have made a statement all right but it was a pretty much no comment statement, and no doubt that when Murphy comes back he'll go underground again. They'll sit there twidling their tumbs because the whole point of McCarthy's reappointment was to get rid of some of the senior players and it's working, perfectly. Every other board would be beggine both sides at this rate, but all they'll do is sit back and watch this carniage develop and grow.

[Zulu]

can't remember anyone every addressing themselves as the spokensperson for the GAA so I don't know WTF you are talking about. Once again a "I'll not have a bad word spoke about the players" post.

Nonsense, both this year and last a number of posters claimed to be speaking for the grassroots of the GAA which is rubbish, secondly every poster that has supported the players readily admits there are issues with the players also but IMO the players are simply using the only weapon in their arsenal when backed into a corner. You seem incapable of reading between the lines here, Gerald McCarthy isn't the real problem, though I've no doubt the players aren't impressed with him as a coach, it is the CB. There are obviously serious, unresolvable issues here and the attitude of the players may not be helping the issue but I have nothing but admiration for a group of players who are willing to stand and fight for waht they believe in regardless of how they might be percieved by the public. When this issue arose again the players could easily have said well just get on with it or retire because the public won't support another 'strike' but they didn't. They took the more difficult path and are once again going to bat for Cork hurling, they are fighting for what they believe is right and if that sully's their reputations then so be it. I know only too well what it is like to deal with 'democratically' elected GAA officials who neither want nor know how to achieve success on the field but won't support others who do. Like I've said before I don't know enough about the details of this fight but I'll certainly defend the players against foul mouthed abuse and scurrilous accusations from internet warriors who know little and do less themselves.

[theskull1]

Cork will be looked after by their CB better than 95% of teams in Ireland

That sentance right there sums up your lack of knowledge about Cork hurling and highlights how clueless you are and your real agenda, because that's the biggest load of bull I've read.
Any true hurling fan could never suppoirt the board if they had any shaddow of a clue.

At least I know now and wont bother replying or fighting what are posts just to whinge about players when you have zero facts or knowledge or history, nothing I mean nothing. That sentence..unbelievable.

Not as feckin clueless as someone who doesn't understand the difference between future tense and past tense.    .

I think everybody is convinced by now that you are one of the players, so forgive your detractors if they don't want to listen to your rantings


Zulu you are being disengenuous in cliaming the last number of posters claim anything of the sort and any reference to them speaking about grass roots I'm sure is simply a straw poll of any other GAA person they have discussed it with. Is this worth arguing about?

So let me try and read between your lines.
You're OK with the treatment meated out to Gerard McCarthy by the players and their Journalist friends? You actually admire what they've done because they willing to stand and fight for what they believe in, regardless of who they degrade. You actually say that it would have been easier for the players who didn't agree with all the bullshit to walk away and that they're great fellas for demeaning one of your Hurling greats in their attempt to get their way.

Fair enough

[Zulu]

Now who is being disengenious skull? I never said I was ok with how Gerald McCarthy has been treated, however I believe the players have every right to tell their coach that they don't think he is up to the job. They are all adults and if they genuinely believe he is not up to it then the honourable thing top do is to tell him face to face. This of course should be kept out of the public domain but the atmosphere is so toxic in Cork at the moment that every act is becoming a bit twisted (see the release of the player opinions on Gerald to the psychologist). And of course I never said they are "great fellas for demeaning one of your Hurling greats in their attempt to get their way", that is you twisting what I said to suit your argument.

This question has been asked by others, John Allen included, but why weren't there other candidates for the Cork job? I mean there are 8 going for the Galway job, there were 4 in for the Limerick job even though it was a done deal beforehand, so how come there weren't any other candidates for the Cork job? Was there not even one club in a county with the biggest number of clubs in the country who had a man in mind that they would like to propose, was there not even one ambitious coach in the country who if approached wouldn't have been interested in throwing his hat in the ring? And as much of a legend as Gerald is, he lost 5 games in 2 years with Cork and a panel of players that were proven AI winners, so he would hardly have been a widely popular choice to carry on amongst Cork GAA folk, would he?

The Cork players may have made some mistakes in this latest impass but surely any impartial observer can see that not everything about Geralds reappointment was above board, though technically it may have been, the spirit of the process wasn't. It looks to me like the CCB took an opportunity to poke at the sleeping dog, so to speak.

[Reillers]

Cork will be looked after by their CB better than 95% of teams in Ireland

That sentance right there sums up your lack of knowledge about Cork hurling and highlights how clueless you are and your real agenda, because that's the biggest load of bull I've read.
Any true hurling fan could never suppoirt the board if they had any shaddow of a clue.

At least I know now and wont bother replying or fighting what are posts just to whinge about players when you have zero facts or knowledge or history, nothing I mean nothing. That sentence..unbelievable.

Not as feckin clueless as someone who doesn't understand the difference between future tense and past tense.    .

I think everybody is convinced by now that you are one of the players, so forgive your detractors if they don't want to listen to your rantings


Zulu you are being disengenuous in cliaming the last number of posters claim anything of the sort and any reference to them speaking about grass roots I'm sure is simply a straw poll of any other GAA person they have discussed it with. Is this worth arguing about?

So let me try and read between your lines.
You're OK with the treatment meated out to Gerard McCarthy by the players and their Journalist friends? You actually admire what they've done because they willing to stand and fight for what they believe in, regardless of who they degrade. You actually say that it would have been easier for the players who didn't agree with all the bullshit to walk away and that they're great fellas for demeaning one of your Hurling greats in their attempt to get their way.

Fair enough

You're an idiot, an idiot or else you're so, so, biased. I haven't decided which one yet. A bit of both I think.
I said that their actions were right, in my last post, but shockingly you didn't read it, and are you kidding me..their journalists friends, seriously..idiot is coming out stronger then biased in this case.
"I admire them for standing up against bullies that are the cb.
I know they're great players who want the best for Cork hurling and it's fruture, it's nothing to do with not getting their way, what they want, it's what Cork needs. And we need rid of Murphy and a better manager then McCarthy.

How about you actually read the lines I wrote. Maybe you should try reading what I actually wrote..but oh wait no, you don't read what anyone writes except of course your own stuff.

So tell me please, justify your comment about Cork getting treated better then 95% of the teams in the country, so plase give me an example that is worse then not having no changing room for a match. Not only did they have no where to change, but no where to get their head ready, to get together talk, prepare for the match, no bloody bathrooms, they'd to get changed in a gym and when the public toilets had a line out the door, they'd to piss in the corner of the gym.
Give me a worse example then that. A board who had to be hung over a ledge, fought to the death in 2002 for basic, basic requirments and needs, not wants. They gave in to that, but then spent the last 6 years trying to claw back the power they gave away. They're too preoccupied with getting back the power they lost to developing Cork hurling around the county, so much so that they said that the team were unlucky not to beat Kilkenny..we were trashed, no luck about that, luck would have been the Kilkenny lads forgetting their hurleys, their bus breaking down..etc.
10 points is a walloping, not unlucky. But sure they were unlucky..according to the board.

Please tell me what board is worse then that, and they are two small examples of how bad they are.  

[theskull1]

Well if you can't beat them join em 

Look I can't find fault in any questions you're asking about why wasn't there more men coming forward to take the job. Very valid and the CCB along with the selection committee should be a bit more transparent about why that was not the case. But do you not agree that there is not a sense here that the position the players have taken here is that they believe they should have the veto over who will manage them whilst at the same time refusing to accept any responsibility for the past two years?

The stance and language the players have chosen has meant that themselves and the scribes are plowing a lone furrow. They have lost the room

That reply was to Zulu BTW

[theskull1]

So tell me please, justify your comment about Cork getting treated better then 95% of the teams in the country, so plase give me an example that is worse then not having no changing room for a match. Not only did they have no where to change, but no where to get their head ready, to get together talk, prepare for the match, no bloody bathrooms, they'd to get changed in a gym and when the public toilets had a line out the door, they'd to piss in the corner of the gym.

Reillers why act like such a p***k with your childish attempts to belittle when you actually look as if you want to win over peoples opinion of the players in this dispute. You only end up hardening attitudes. Very similar to the players indeed

Is that the criteria for deciding how well a county team is treated? A one night balls up in arrangements for what I can only presume was a challenge game? Hardly a fair guage of how well you are being treated overall. Is the food being served up in mallow not good enough? Youse get it better than most in terms of being well treated. Do youse even realise that?

[Reillers]

So tell me please, justify your comment about Cork getting treated better then 95% of the teams in the country, so plase give me an example that is worse then not having no changing room for a match. Not only did they have no where to change, but no where to get their head ready, to get together talk, prepare for the match, no bloody bathrooms, they'd to get changed in a gym and when the public toilets had a line out the door, they'd to piss in the corner of the gym.

Reillers why act like such a p***k with your childish attempts to belittle when you actually look as if you want to win over peoples opinion of the players in this dispute. You only end up hardening attitudes. Very similar to the players indeed

Is that the criteria for deciding how well a county team is treated? A one night balls up in arrangements for what I can only presume was a challenge game? Hardly a fair guage of how well you are being treated overall. Is the food being served up in mallow not good enough? Youse get it better than most in terms of being well treated. Do youse even realise that?

Insults instead of answers, there are constant examples I gave one, you want more I could list them. Food being served up, you mean pathetic little mayo sandwiches instead of the recomended plate load of carbs, so no the food isn't near good enough. Continue to ignore them if you want,  that bias but they are and have been treated shockingly by the board, it's common knowledge, now answer my question, give me examples of worse (REAL not made up) treatment of that and good examples of how we're treated, (whatever good standard they have is one they had to draw blood from a turnip to get back in 2002.)

Examples, please.

[theskull1]

You threw the insults first Reillers remember?

And you want that idiot to answer your questions? WTF?

[Reillers]

Statement not an insult. A clear, clear statement. You're not answering my question because you can't.

[theskull1]

Statement not an insult. A clear, clear statement. You're not answering my question because you can't.

I will answer your question when you stop the semantics. "Statement not an insult"...ffs ....so you can't insult someone with a "statement" which "states" that he is an idiot? Are you serious

[Reillers]

You wont answer me because you can't.You were acting like an idiot so I said it. You keep bouncing around the question. You wont answer me because you can't. You're just stalling time at this stage, what's wrong with this post that you wont answer, punctuation, spelling? 
It's taken you this long and you still haven't come up with an answer, it says it all really, you don't have any examples. There are none. 

[theskull1]

You were acting like a p***k so I called you one. I know I insulted you. Why can you admit that you started the insults first, making your offense to my comments very hollow indeed.

Do that and I promise I will answer your question.