TV3 showing Limerick/Dublin, RTE showing the weaker of the quarter finals its just been announced.
Came across this yesterday on another fourm
Very good interview with Cian OāNeill from last month
Still Cian to improve
The Kieran Shannon Interview
Saturday, June 18, 2011
THE memory still triggers a surge of electricity through Cian OāNeill.
Read more: http://www.examiner.ie/sport/gaa/still-cian-to-improve-158261.html#ixzz1S9pb8c2h
His first meeting with Liam Sheedy face-to-face in the Abbey Court Hotel in Nenagh was only minutes old and it was already apparent he wasnāt so much being offered the job of training the Tipperary hurlers as being interviewed for it and that Sheedy was seeking not just expertise but something more elemental.
āAre you ambitious?ā said Sheedy, looking OāNeill straight in the eye.
OāNeill, as someone with a first-class honours degree in PE and a lectureship in that discipline, could only respond in the affirmative: extremely so.
āWell, thatās good,ā said Sheedy, ābecause I donāt want anyone around this team that hasnāt got the ambition to win All-Irelands.ā
āThat blew me away,ā says OāNeill, recalling that meeting in the autumn of 2007, āand it set the tone for the Liam Iād know for the next three years.ā
OāNeill would make just as fine an impression in his first meeting with the players. Declan Fanning trooped down that day to OāNeillās workplace in the University of Limerick, and would naturally have had some reservations about how much a former Kildare footballer would be able to adapt to inter-county hurling.
Those doubts were immediately dispelled.
āFrom day one, Cian brought a total professional outlook. Iād say 90% of the drills and tests he did we had a hurley in our hand. And every day for the next three years heād have something different lined up for us. That amazed me. It was no way repetitive. Everything he does is with a purpose.ā
Fanning was 28, in his supposed prime, when he first encountered OāNeill, yet when he retired three years later with a freshly-minted All-Ireland medal in his pocket, he was so much fitter and stronger than his BC (Before Cian) incarnation.
āCian made sure you were getting progressively fitter year by year, rather than doing the same old slog and starting from scratch every year. It was so important he stayed on after the management stepped down. Most of the players are now into their third or fourth year with Cian so theyāll reach another level this year, Iām convinced. He wouldnāt be out of place working at Anfield or Old Trafford. Heās that good.ā
For OāNeill, it has also been a continuous progression. He looks back on how he was when he first met Fanning and the others, and for all the respect he instantly commanded, he was green in other ways as well.
āThe most important thing I learned that first season was the human factor,ā he says in that candid, convivial manner of his. "When Iām teaching my students here in UL, whether itās Sports Science or PE, I say, āWe donāt teach PE, we donāt coach basketball, we donāt coach soccer ā we coach and teach people.ā You need to be able to connect with them to coach them. I came in knowing an awful lot about fitness but I didnāt know what made Conor OāMahony click, I didnāt know what got the bit between the teeth for Eoin Kelly.
"When we came in, we had a lot of hard work to do because they [the whole panel] werenāt in any way conditioned and in those first few nights I would have looked at Conor and said, āWell, heās going to need a kick up the backside.ā But the other lads told me, āDonāt worry; come championship, thatās when he really steps it up.ā And it was so true. Once he got his baseline fitness in and the ground hardened, Conor was a man against boys out there and he ended up an All Star that year.
āThat was a valuable lesson. Iād actually said, āAre the two of us going to be able to work together? Why isnāt everyone up there at the same pace with Shane McGrath?ā Very naĆÆve on my part. Because everyone has different shapes and sizes. Conor is built differently. Eoin only starts to motor come championship because his body shape and history is different to everyone elseās. It took me that first season to realise all that.ā
OāNeillās own body has had its history. He grew up in Newbridge, one of the countryās great secular sporting towns at the time, and would play soccer with the thriving Newbridge Town in the hugely-competitive Dublin leagues; basketball in National Schools Cup finals with Patrician College alongside his good friend Dermot Earley; as well as football with Moorefield and a host of Kildare underage teams. He played and loved all those sports, too much so as it turned out. At 16 he had to sit out six months of school with a knee stress fracture. By the time he was 18, he had knee surgery for a third time.
"If I was a child again Iād probably do the exact same thing all over again, but if I was a parent of a child and knowing what I know now, I would have specialised in one sport from 16 on. The research conclusively shows that ā play as many sports as you can in your formative years because theyāve complementary skills, though donāt necessarily play them all at a high level, but then if you want to excel in any of them, you need to be specialising around 16.
āIām not saying drop the other sports but minimise them to maybe the one team and reduce the number of teams you play for in your chosen sport as well. At 16, I was playing for three or four different soccer and basketball teams and the Moorefield seniors as well. Recovery is often the key performance indicator that people leave out. They do their strength work, their conditioning, their technical and tactical; they donāt drink, they donāt smoke ā but do they rest? I didnāt. It wasnāt anyoneās fault. We just didnāt know any better.ā
After leaving school, football would become OāNeillās first-choice sport but even then it was compromised. He would play for UL and the Kildare U21s in the spring, then spend his summers working in a games camp in Mallorca and by the time heād return Moorefield were invariably already out of the championship. In 2000 alright he was called up by Mick OāDwyer to the Kildare senior panel only to tear his shoulder ligaments, and then when he was recalled in the winter of 2002 after helping Moorefield win their second county title in three years, he was involved in a six-car collision. For a few weeks it seemed he was fine, lifting weights as normal, but then one day doing the groceries, he and his basket collapsed to the aisle floor. His back would need to have two discs removed and he would never play competitive sport again.
āItās a regret. In college, Iād go to Spain for the summer because I thought, āAh, youāll have eight or nine years yet playing senior football, youāll get back playing for Kildareā, but when the second opportunity came, I had that accident.ā
As his muscular physique suggests, he still works out, but only in certain windows. Two years ago he was in another crash, this time the driver of the other car ploughing right into his passenger side, which thankfully was vacant. OāNeillās first instinct was to move his car to free up the traffic he was blocking but as soon as he did, the other driver sped off. That driver would be later identified but OāNeill would need another two discs removed and every two months or so, his back is seriously put out. Last Sunday was the latest shock of it and when we meet in midweek on the UL campus, heās still carrying a slight limp. In a few days heāll be ready to work out again, before the back and the programme will shut down again.
OāNeill knows what his body can and canāt do. Itās his job to know what the body can and canāt do, but if anything, OāNeill sees himself more as a coach than a trainer. In college he took over the UL menās basketball team before managing the Sigerson team and in 2005 he helped Kilmihil to a Clare intermediate final. A year later at just 27 he was brought in by Mickey Ned OāSullivan to coach and train the Limerick footballers. Pretty soon, OāSullivan was publicly proclaiming that OāNeill was the best trainer in the country but for OāNeill it was another steep learning curve.
āYou were working with lads who were coming off some great years with Liam [Kearns] and if you werenāt on your game, you could tell from their reaction. There would have been sessions that should have been more challenging and when I should have given the lads more credit but it forced me to become better by working harder.ā
Inadvertently, he also learned from Pat Spillane. In 2006 Limerick played a Munster semi-final against Cork best remembered for its sheer awfulness from which only James Masters, by virtue of scoring eight of the dayās measly 14 points, emerged with any credit. The following week, Spillaneās newspaper column ridiculed Limerickās use of tackle bags in their warm-up.
āI thought at the time it was a good idea to get that physical contact in,ā OāNeill says, ābut the more I reflected on it after [Spillaneās piece], I said, āWell, why are we running into tackle bags when weāll be running into tackles?ā I never used them again in a warm-up after that.ā
So, Spillane was right? OāNeill ponders. āYes. I donāt think he knows why he was right, because for warming up the body, it was totally legitimate, but from a game perspective, I had lost sight of the wood from the trees. With Tipp now Iād use tackle bags every sixth session or so, for metabolic conditioning ā getting tired, getting up, getting tired, getting back up. Weād even emphasise that before a training session. Iāll ask, the teacher coming out in me, āWhy are the bags out here tonight?ā āFor specific conditioning.ā Whereas when weāre tackling there is no tackle bag out and I ask, āWhat do we do when we tackle? We tackle.ā We make that distinction. Even the term ātackle bagā is a silly one in hurling because it has nothing to do with the tackle. We just use it so they can hit it, get tired, then move on to a ball and strike, because if you went into a man 10 times in a session, youāre going to flatten his shoulder.ā
At the end of 2007, OāNeill stepped down as Limerickās coach to dedicate his energy to revitalising UL football which was ādeadā at the time, but within a week, Liam Sheedy was on to him. OāNeill had trained hurlers before, in UL and Toomevara, and though the optics didnāt look great, it wasnāt a case of abandoning the Limerick footballers for the more glamorous stage Tipp hurling afforded.
āPeople have often said that I shouldnāt have left Limerick but I had already called Mickey Ned before Liam called me. And the thing about Tipp was it would be just fitness. Planning a physical session is something I can do with my eyes closed, just driving to it, whereas coaching involves so much more preparation and mental energy.ā
A lot of thought still goes into his sessions though. Losing to Waterford in the 2008 All-Ireland semi-final in particular prompted serious deliberation.
āThat day it felt as if we had been hit by a bus,ā says OāNeill, hardly flippantly, considering heās been involved in two car accidents. āMy personal goal after that was to up our contact level ā being able to initiate contact and deal with contact ā because we were physically bullied that day. It wasnāt that they were bigger or stronger; they were just far more aggressive. So what we said was that the following year weād make sure that my parts of the session were more ferocious than any opponent could impose on us.ā
Now Tipp are top of the pile and Declan Ryan recognises how vital OāNeill had been in climbing that ascent. Selling OāNeill on staying was always going to be relatively easily because of his allegiance to the players but it was all the more impressive when Ryan said in their first phone conversation that as a Tipp supporter who had been in the stand all last year, he wanted to thank OāNeill personally. That humility resonated with OāNeill and he was also touched when Ryan, in the dressing room after the victory over Cork last month, thanked OāNeill and the rest of the backroom staff for their role in helping the team produce such a performance. Ryanās not as animated as Sheedy but thereās a sincerity and native intelligence about him that OāNeill finds endearing, while only Tommy Dunneās methodology, not his overriding philosophy, differs from Eamon OāSheaās.
āThereās a brilliant atmosphere in the camp now,ā says OāNeill. āWe had a slow start which was inevitable. It was tough to get that balance right between the lads bringing in their own new ideas and then continuing what weād had before. Since April itās really taken off. Iād say in the last two months weāve gone up at least two or three levels.ā
OāNeill has looked to raise his own game too. His research in UL demands that heās constantly reading the latest findings in the sports science journals. This winter heāll observe and even take a few Collingwood AFL sessions Down Under. Warm-ups in particular intrigue him. Half an hour before football games when his friends still want to be in the pub, he has to be in the ground. Last year before his friends had warmed their seats for Kildareās opening championship game, he could tell them Louth were going to win. Kildare had only given themselves eight minutes back out on the field before throw-in and those eight had been largely unstructured. Since then heās observed that Kildareās warm-ups are among the most purposeful in all of football. He aspires that Tippās is the same in hurling.
āMy preamble for every warm-up is āWhy do we do this?ā And the players say, āTo win.ā It doesnāt matter who weāre playing, what level of competition is, where the ground is, what the conditions are, weāre trying to win, so theyāre mindful the warm-up is part of the routine and process of winning. Then I ask, āAnd what invariably happens when we warm-up?ā āWe win.āā
Read more: http://www.examiner.ie/sport/gaa/still-cian-to-improve-158261.html#ixzz1S9pJiex9
In the Sunday times yesterday Denis Walsh said that last Sunday was the sixth time in 10 years that Waterford had conceded 5 goals or more in a championship match. I can only think of one other occasion they conceded 5. Limerick in 2007. Did Denis make up this stat?
We got 5 goals, Dan the man got none.
here you are stats
even if you reduce the requirement to 4 goals conceded, itās nowhere near 10 games, back as far as 03.
It looks like it.
2001- Lost to Limerick, conceded 4 I think
2003- 3 to Cark in MF, Lost to Wexford & Clare in qualifiers I think? Didnāt concede 5 goals though
2004- Lots to KK- 3 goals only I think?
2005- Cark- Brian Corcoran got goal
2006- Cark again in semi, naughton with only goal.
2007- 5 goals
2008- 3-30
2009- KK in semi, Tipp in MF (4 conceded)
2010- Won Munster, hammered by Tipp in semi but no 5 goals
2011- 5 goals
I could have just checked that website actually, never heard of it.
youāre right, they did concede 4 in a ridiculous collapse.
think iron mike might have bagged one. balbec or ccha might know.
not sure if hurling stats is as up to date as it used to be, but a fine resource nonetheless
Clare scored 4 against them in 2004
Ollie Moran, James Butler and Brian Begley (2) - pretty much a carbon copy of what Begley did in 2007. This was the final ever Munster championship knockout match.
Iād say you have to go back to 1990 for the last time before 2007 that Waterford conceded 5. So that would be three times in 21 years that Waterford conceded 5 or more. Which is probably on a par with any county.
You would wonder about a journo inventing a stat like that just to prove a point. I wonder has he some fatwa against Davy or Waterford?
And of course GAA journos are always telling us to beware of the inaccuracies posted by nutters on the net.
They were hammered in Semple Stadium in Dalys first game I thought ?
Clare scored the 4 goals v Waterford in 2005 in Ennis - Waterford hockeyed them in '04
Limerick scored 4 in the 2003 Munster semi as well - the game that wasnāt televised due to a strike
I see Aiden Fogarty is back training ans should be available for the A/I semi final. Will be a good option off the bench
Bench? If he regains full fitness I could see Cody dropping Richie Hogan for him. Taggy has been one of our most consistent players since 06. His work ethic also puts him high on Codys list.
Be good to have him back.
Am a bit worried about Dublin in this weeks game, I think we will be beaten. The reason why I think this is that I feel we are lacking the intensity needed to be successful in championship hurling and also we are not scoring goals. In terms of championship intensity I feel we are behind KK, Tipp, Galway, Limerick, I would feel a lot more confident if we were playing Waterford rather than Limerick. I think the only way we are going to improve the intensity is by playing in these games and the players getting the experience of the difference between League hurling and championship hurling so that this last step can be taken.
Jesus Tazā¦ Ye showed a fair bit of intensity against us in Tullamore. I wouldnāt worry about ye on that front. I would worry about the inability to score goals alright. Our inability to score goals in the past few years was aot of the reason for our inability to get to a semi final since 05.
Galway camp very quiet in lead up to this game. I see the Irish Times had to resort to rehashing old articles to get in the build up this week. Iāll travel in the comfort that our team seems to have found a bit of confidence which has been missing for quiet a while now. If we enter Thurles in the right frame of mind we will beat Waterford. The inability to compete with the Dubs in Tullamore still bugs me thoughā¦ how could we have been so heavy footed that day? Or was the intensity to the Dubs to much to deal with?
Kinvara, I donāt know, there seems to be something lacking with the Dubs since the championship started. We struggled against Offaly in the first game, I think we got lucky against Galway because they were so poor that night and I think if we played them now we wouldnāt win, we got a lesson in what real championship hurling is about against KK and that KK team was one that we only beat a few weeks previously. Maybe its just the experience of playing in the latter stages of the championship but I just feel there is something missing besides the goals. I think we should beat Limerick but at the moment I donāt have the confidence in the team do it or maybe I just think Limerick are actually better than what they really are.
taz,
Ye have plenty of intensity. Ye are lacking 3 or 4 top top players that is all. That is what is separating kk, tipp and galway from the rest at this point in time.