Donncha O’Connor’s leadership qualities could be key to Cork’s season

A plethora of heavyweight names have left the Cork dressing room in recent years but even as Brian Cuthbert has begun to assemble a new-look side, the return of one of the old school could be the key to their season. Just like that, Donncha O’Connor found himself as the senior man at training when he committed to another season last January.

He must have found the number of absent faces and voices staggering: no Canty, no Alan O’Connor, no Pearse O’Neill or Alan Quirke or Noel O’Leary or Paudie Kissane. Last winter, you could have got fairly short odds on O’Connor joining that list. His 2014 championship was rendered all but non-existent because of recurring Achilles trouble that flared up in the league. He was sidelined as Cork’s summer was thrown into tumult after a heavy defeat by Kerry and tried to gather their coordinates in the qualifiers.

They moved through to the quarter-finals without ever shedding a sense of vulnerability where O’Connor, fittingly, came in and quickly grabbed a goal that made a game of it. The act was typical of the Ballydesmond man, who has made a career of prolific scoring achieved with such minimum fuss that it didn’t quite get the praise it merited.

Only O’Connor could come in from the bench in a league semi-final and hit 2-3 – as he did against Armagh in 2011 — and not end up with a man of the match award. “I thought so too,” he laughed at a subsequent press event when someone told him they thought he should have gotten it.

Moral symbol

But then, O’Connor was arguably the key moral symbol in Cork’s All-Ireland final win the previous September and he still finished the year without an All-Star.

He was unlucky in that what was a wide open summer produced an All Star full forward line up of Colm Cooper, Bernard Brogan and Benny Coulter. Still, when you look at the reasons why Cork beat Down that day, O’Connor’s name tops the short list.

It wasn’t a classic and it was meant to be the beginning rather than the summit of the achievements of a gilded generation of Cork footballers. Because that final was followed by Dublin’s return to the pinnacle after a 16-year gap and then the Donegal revolution, its closeness has been forgotten. Cork trailed by 0-7 to 0-2 at one stage and won the thing by a single point. In a taut second half, O’Connor emerged as the key force of will and leadership for his team, memorably urging both his team mates and the Cork crowd on after landing a point which brought them within one point during a nervy second half.

Some scores simply weigh more than others: as well as adding to the scoreboard, they shift momentum and mindset and self-belief in a way that cannot be accurately measured. O’Connor was at the heart of Cork’s surge that day.

He landed 0-5, a significant haul in an All-Ireland final for any player, but as usual he converted those scores with the nimble economy that has become his trademark. And his contribution was praised, no question, but he was overlooked by the All Star selectors.

For good measure, he had chipped in with 1-5 (1-4 from placed balls) in a gripping semi-final win against Dublin as Cork negotiated what was to become a high-wire All-Ireland act.

Having finally netted their prize in 2010, the expectation was that Cork were primed to dominate in the years ahead. And they were always in with a shout but teams emerged unexpectedly, with this weekend’s league final opponents Donegal coming from nowhere to eclipse Cork in an enthralling All-Ireland semi-final in 2012. In the years since, the game has changed for poaching, shoot-on-the-turn forwards like O’Connor.

Sea of defenders

Space disappeared and inside forwards became lost in a sea of defenders. O’Connor was asked about the development in the winter of 2012.

“Certainly, a lot of teams – and it is not just Donegal . . . they seem to get a lot of the blame for this defensive system but a lot of teams drop an extra man back. They seem to be a bit slower in getting out of again. Other teams move back up the field faster so it looks worse than what it is. But it is hard, you have to be a lot fitter and keeping playing it around until you can break them down. You play it as you see it. Once you have the ball, they don’t have it. And don’t get frustrated if you can’t get in the first time, try the second and third time. Eventually someone will lose concentration somewhere and you will probably get in then.”

Three seasons on, not a lot has changed. There is an element of the unreal about tomorrow’s series of semi-finals: you could feel national interest deflating last Sunday. But the chances are that Cork will come up against the customary Donegal defence incorporating both man-to-man and zone attention.

O’Connor has been held in reserve on what is an accomplished Cork bench but if the game is testy and draining in the second half, it will be no surprise to see him sent in, somehow the grandee of the panel now but still coming up with the goods.