O’Donnell lauds selfless group

By Shane Brophy

The dressing room after any title success is always a special place.

After the acclaim from supporters and family, it is back to the sanctum of the dressing room where the bond is forged for the weeks and months in advance. It’s where the players and mentors, the key personalities, can celebrate and reflect on what they have achieved.

And that is what Nenagh CBS manager Donach O’Donnell did as his players huddled in the middle of the Cusack Park dressing room with the Harty Cup held aloft. O’Donnell sat alone, looking at the joy on his players and taking in what they had just achieved, a first Harty Cup for St Joseph’s CBS.

“It’s just unbelievable,” began the Nenagh CBS manager.

“It was an unbelievable way to win a match, and in fairness they are such a good bunch and they have been like that all year.

“They have stayed in matches when they shouldn’t have been in it, they stayed chipping away and put the head down. We always talk about the half hook, the half block, getting the foot in, and it end the end in came down to that at the end. They kept the ball alive, kept plugging away, and it is hard wired into them as we do it a lot on training.

“They are so selfless as a group; they don’t mind doing the hard work for the guy beside them and that is a testament to them.”

And that selflessness was required in a game where Ardscoil Ris were getting the scores a little easier, while also trying to counteract Nenagh’s strength in captain Darragh McCarthy who was man-marked throughout with Jamie Moylan playing as a sweeper in the half-back line.

“When he is being double marked it means there is someone else free,” O’Donnell added.

“Our guys know that. Darragh doesn’t mind taking the punishment for the other guys.”

The Nenagh management also made a key tactical switch at half time with midfielder Ciaran Foley moving to centre back after Jake Hackett had a tough first half with Ardscoil Ris captain Fintan Fitzgerald who scored four points from play in the opening half.”

“Jake (Hackett) was getting caught between coming and going a little bit and Ciaran is very good to sit” O’Donnell said.

“We moved Jake back later on again. We work on that a lot, we played an awful lot of challenge matches where we move lads in and out of positions and we discover something about a guy.”

Cork native O’Donnell has been involved with Nenagh CBS teams for over a decade in two separate spells as they quested to win a first Harty Cup and he commended the players for their dedication and purpose which led to the ultimate reward.

O’Donnell revealed: “I had a chat with three or four of them in the dressing room one day and they were talking about the Harty Cup being the dream and I said, it is there if you want it.

“They started gradually to believe it, and we watched videos, winning games, and played loads of challenge matches, trying lads in different positions, and it all started to come together, and eventually we started to improve, and the players could see the improvement and it built their confidence.”

Despite there being an All-Ireland title still to compete for, one which Nenagh won in 2012 and they’ll refocus later this week, but in many ways they have achieved their grail quest.

“The Harty is the one, if you don’t win it, you consider the year not being successful,” O’Donnell added.

“We have finally won it. The last time we went onto win the All-Ireland, but we had no Harty but now we have them both.”