REBEL BOSS McCARTHY FEELING THE HEAT
FOR those finding themselves exasperated with the current football set-up in Cork, there has been the temptation to suggest that they look closer to home.
In the aftermath of Cork’s eightpoint defeat to Clare, former manager and All-Ireland winning captain Larry Tompkins did not spare Ronan McCarthy’s struggling county team.
He questioned the commitment and the character of the players, suggesting ‘they were too soft to really make it happen.’
McCarthy bit back this week, accusing Tompkins of ‘selective amnesia’ and reminding Tompkins that Cork knew troubled times when the Kildare native was at the helm on Leeside.
In Tompkins’ final season, Cork went out of the 2003 Munster Championship on the back of a 10-point hammering by Limerick and had their interest in the opening round of the qualifiers terminated by Roscommon, when the manager was confronted on the sideline by a Rebel County supporter.
It was quite an undignified — and ill-deserved — exit for one of the county’s all-time greats, but if you stay around long enough in Cork football, you will inevitably end up taking a kicking from your own.
That is where McCarthy stands now and although he did not enjoy a stellar playing career like Tompkins, it was one well served. The high-point came, ironically, under Tompkins when he started as corner-back in the 1999 All-Ireland final with his stand-out performance coming earlier that summer when he put the shackles on Maurice Fitzgerald in the Munster final.
Since he retired in 2002, he has gone on to serve in every capacity — as a selector, coach and now manager, but the likelihood is that it will all end in tears.
He is currently in danger of taking Cork down to the Allianz League’s third tier, an indignity that will move closer should they fail to beat Tipperary on Saturday night.
With one point from four games, this spring campaign may be a horror show but it is not a tale of the unexpected.
Even so, the sight of the GAA’s biggest county failing to beat the smallest — Fermanagh — jarred, while that defeat to Clare was their third on the bounce to the Banner, an illustration of how far they have fallen.
Cork’s graph has been in decline ever since they lost to Donegal in the 2012 All-Ireland semi-final, but McCarthy’s misfortune is that he has been involved in three of the four management teams since.
He arrived in Conor Counihan’s final year in 2013 and stayed on for the first season as coach with Brian Cuthbert. When Peadar Healy’s disastrous two-year term ended in 2017, emboldened by managing Carbery Rangers to their first Cork title, he took on a three-year term in the top job.
The likelihood is that he will do well to see that out.
If Cork are relegated next month, the summer is likely to offer no relief.
Indeed, so low are expectations that a defeat to Tipperary this summer might be welcomed as they would then avoid having to play Kerry who doled out a mauling to them last term.
That defeat and a subsequent humiliation in the qualifiers by Tyrone — an aggregate loss of 35 points — was a major low and clarified the need for change in McCarthy’s mind.
He has delivered on that, both in terms of personnel and game plan but there has been no upturn in fortunes.
Lack of quality remains the stumbling block. The retirements of Colm O’Neill and Donncha O’Connor — although neither had much left to give — was a blow to an attack that has few high-level finishers on which to call.
The county’s best emerging prospect, Mark Keane, has been lost to the AFL and their best player, Sean Powter, has been injured for the past 12 months.
When Powter — a Douglas clubmate of McCarthy’s — returned last weekend, he made a significant contribution in netting Cork’s only goal against Meath in what was a third defeat on the bounce.
And while his game plan has been ineffective, given what happened last summer he had little choice but to develop a system on which his young team could lean.
However, the sense that things have been unravelling on him for some time, is hard to ignore.
True, results have left Cork’s tiny band of supporters disillusioned, but so have some of McCarthy’s decisions – notably playing Paul Kerrigan in a sweeper role last weekend.
He lost selectors Ciaran O’Sullivan and Eamonn Ryan in the close season, but did not move to fill them until instructed to by the county board earlier this month. Even then, he declined the opportunity to bring in a fresh perspective, opting to promote Eddie Kirwan and Gary O’Halloran from his backroom team to the roles.
He did appoint former Wexford and Kildare manager Jason Ryan in a consultative role, but the indications are that McCarthy is very much running his own show here.
However, another defeat this weekend and he may also find that he is running out of road.