GAELIC GAMES: MALACHY CLERKINhears Brian Cody outline how his side are probably a step ahead of where they were for the National League final defeat to Dublin
BRIAN CODY leaned back against the wall outside the Kilkenny dressingroom, yakking cheerfully away to the RTÉ radio reporter Pauric Lodge.
Well, as cheerfully as Brian Cody tends to yak away.
He’d done the same before the game to TV reporter Clare McNamara and would again when he was done with us. Boycott? What boycott? We can all breathe out, it seems. The association will not fall.
Cody was smiling as he turned to the written brethren. The scoreline said this was routine stuff but the Kilkenny manager knew it hadn’t been that straightforward. Hop-stepping down to Wexford Park for a championship game wasn’t something any of his panel had had to do before.
Doing so after getting pushed around in the National League final added an extra frisson. Cody likes asking his players questions and then staring them down for the answer. “We were outfought in the league final but our intent at all times was decent and our preparation at all times was decent. We were where we were on the league final day, and we’re probably a step ahead of that right now.
“There was huge anticipation down here having won the under-21 the other night against ourselves, their footballers having won at their home venue, a huge crowd here. It’s a great place to come.
“I like that opportunity to come down and test your nerve in that situation. That’s what we did. You don’t tend to have the opportunity very much.
“We were in Tullamore against Galway, but that’s not a home venue for Galway. Coming down here you sample that in the league, but it’s different in the championship and the summer months.”
This was sticky for a while but they came through. Good to get the league final out of the system, Brian?
“I don’t see it like that, to be honest. It didn’t ever take me over or anything like that. We had a very bad day and Dublin played very well. That’s it. We were lucky to get to the league final, to be fair about it.
“Some people say we did very well to get to the league final. We stumbled to the final in lots of ways. But that’s where we got to and we were punished, and very much punished on the day, and Dublin completely outhurled us.
“But that’s no harm either: the real world is where that was that day, and we just try to take it on from there and try and work our way back into things. We did reasonably well tonight and we look forward to the Leinster final.”
Wexford manager Colm Bonnar will go on pushing the boulder up the hill, nourished by a little hope and maybe the return to fitness of a few of his older soldiers. He knows that at the very least he’ll need to flush some strength and guile into his midfield for the qualifiers.
“Kilkenny put us under immense pressure in there in the first half, they picked up every breaking ball from our own puck-out.
“That’s something we tried to change around at half-time and we maybe did it for the initial five or 10 minutes at the start of the second half and we started to win a bit more hard ball around that area.
“But really from then on Kilkenny dominated and got a foothold there and we just found it very hard to get in among them. They’re a very physical team and a very hungry team.
“We always knew that but we just felt that if we could get close to them and worry them and keep the scores down, that we could make the most of the home crowd but it just didn’t happen.”
