Always fated to be a central figure

It appeared a random sort of move, quite in keeping with the leisurely nature of an opening National League fixture. Cork's football selectors named Owen Sexton at centre back for the trip to Offaly. The player wasn't unfamiliar with the position but his senior inter-county career to date had been played out in the corner.

In some ways the move was inevitable. Sexton had won a minor All-Ireland in 1993 at centre back and progress in the county's corner had been less than smooth in his previous league match which saw him substituted in the quarter-final against Donegal after Brendan Devenney helped himself to two first-half goals.

Sexton isn't, however, short of defence advocates. John Meyler is in charge of the teams at Cork IT where the player was a student. "That was right in the middle of his exams," says Meyler, "and chemical engineering is not an easy subject. He's a good footballer and intelligent. I played him in-field, centre back and mid-field because of his overall fitness and gave him a loose rein.

"He's a tremendous character, full of life and enthusiasm, full of everything that's good about Sigerson (Cup) football characters - one of the best I've come across in the competition," he says. "I was really sorry he had to go without winning a medal."

His performances this season have been framed by an evolving defensive unit. Settled over the last three matches, the backs have played with cohesion, supporting each other and demonstrating an intuitive understanding when working the ball out of defence.

The tight marking and mobile defending was a feature of most of Cork's matches since Christmas, especially when All-Ireland champions Galway came to visit in February and were beaten by a late penalty. That afternoon, Sexton showed pace and perception in keeping track of Michael Donnellan as well as anyone can when coping with the Dunmore man's searing pace.

Barring disaster tomorrow, the defence will be retained in the championship. Established figures and former captains Mark O'Connor and Steven O'Brien can't command a place - although O'Brien remains an option in the forwards when fully recovered from injury.

The difficulties of player availability for the new league season forced Cork's management to try out an experimental defence for the Offaly match in October.

"We had no choice at the beginning of the league," says Cork selector Paddy Sheahan about deploying Sexton as the defensive pivot. "Then he did well there and he likes the position.

"He's a good reader of the game and good to hold the centre. Anyone coming through will have to pass him."

Yet he isn't slow to get forward and has the pace to do it incisively. Furthermore, his distribution at the other end is excellent, keeping the ball away from opponents and occasionally - as with Mark O'Sullivan's second goal in the quarter-final with Derry - pulling out the killer ball.

Behind this detail of a career in progress is an unusual background. His club Kilbrittain is an anomalous presence in the footballing landscape of West Cork. The club is consumed with hurling and football has been such a peripheral concern that Sexton is the first member to play for the Cork senior footballers.

His genetic disposition is impressive, according to a piece written by Kieran O'Driscoll in an article in the Cork yearbook to mark Sexton's selection as Young Footballer of the Year in 1996.

Mary, Owen's sister, won an All-Ireland junior camogie medal and football was introduced a long time ago into the line when his great grand-uncle Mick Mehigan captained Cork club Lees to the 1911 All-Ireland.

Mick's brother was Paddy or PD Mehigan, the pioneering Gaelic games journalist who wrote as Carbery in the Cork Examiner and who as Pato was this newspaper's first GAA correspondent.

More recently his uncle Fr Michael Sexton captained Waterford's minor footballers while a clerical student in Dungarvan.

With the Kilbrittain club, Sexton won his first medal - in a West Cork under-14 hurling competition in 1988. Further under-age success followed and he became a late addition to the minor football panel in 1993, quickly making the centre back position his own and playing a major role in the All-Ireland success.

He came into the senior panel during the 1996 National League campaign. Initially a corner back, he played himself into the first team in that position but many familiar with his game would argue that the position is too restrictive for someone of his stamina and dynamism.

"If you play him at corner back, he'll end up as corner forward. He's a real up-and-down the field sort of player. I wouldn't have played him in the corner because he had a fantastic ability to link with backs and forwards," says Sheahan.

"He's doing a good job. It shows that if you don't try you won't succeed."