From here to Clare: no divided loyalties for Donal Óg Cusack

Of all the novelties within this weekend’s hurling quarter-finals at Páirc Uí Chaoimh – and they are many – spare a thought for the conflicting one: the Cork man, coaching a Clare team, against the All-Ireland champions Tipperary, back in the stadium he once owned.

Not that Donal Óg Cusack necessarily sees it that way. His loyalties, for a start, rest solely with Clare, and the Munster hurling final last Sunday certainly tested that. As convincing, and deserving, as Cork’s victory was, it in no way eased the pain Cusack felt in defeat for his currently adopted county.

“It’s not that long since I was playing,” he says, “and I even felt it the other night . . . darkness is not the right word, but it’s ‘hello whatever my old friend again’.

“You still wake up at 4am. All the things from the game come into your head. So I feel for the players, going through all those emotions, and I know those emotions are draining.

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“But you have to pick it up, and it’s good it’s only been the two weeks. I don’t like the long breaks, and the training-to-games ratio in our game is crazy. So what better way to bring the focus back than to play the All-Ireland champions, in Páirc Uí Chaoimh, big new stadium, in an All-Ireland quarter-final that is there to be won.”

From the heart

Cusack, as usual, is speaking from the heart, and, strange as it might feel to be at the first championship game to be played at the revamped Páirc Uí Chaoimh wearing a Clare tracksuit (who honestly could have imagined that?), now is not the time to be getting sentimental. Saturday’s showdown against Tipperary (3.0) is all about the here and now.

“You can only see what’s in front of you,” says Cork’s three-time All-Ireland winning goalkeeper, who retired in 2013. Clare, he says, hadn’t looked beyond that Munster final, and whatever about their failings in that game, it’s all Tipperary now.

“Cork have definitely been the story of the summer, and were deserving winners, and they’ve been going from strength to strength, a real good management, in Kieran Kingston. I was involved with Kieran, and a lot of people would ask about Kieran, but he’s been involved a good number of years. Even when I was in my last year, Kieran was there.

“Like everybody, you review the game, you look to moments. You could say we created a lot of chances in the game. Cathal [Malone] got on the end of a good ball from Shane O’Donnell, in the 11th minute, and hit the post. Podge [Collins] got a point after that, but Cork went down and got a goal.

‘Deserving winners’

“And I think there was a period when Cork got five points in a row before the end of the first half, and we never closed that gap. Actually, at the start of the second half we had four wides, and two balls in Anthony [Nash]’s hands. So it’s only natural we’d be looking at all those opportunities we created, but Cork were deserving winners.

“And absolutely live All-Ireland contenders now. Look at the Munster championship they’re after winning. Tipp, Waterford, and ourselves, probably a different proposition again.”

Clare, he says, know exactly the task at hand on Saturday. “You’ve all seen Tipperary. They started off the year, the word coming out they were so determined to win two in a row, then the Cork game was a shock to their system, obviously.

“It looks now as if their machine is starting to build again. Dublin are not at the very top table of hurling, but are still a top team, and for any team to do that to another team was a serious statement.

“I fully believe in the group. But we have to. It’s do or die. There is no back door. This is it. It’s one of the thing in our sport. We feel the summer is only here, but you can become a spectator, very quickly. And anyone involved in it doesn’t want to be a spectator. They want to be in the thick of it.

“Obviously I am a Cork man, played for Cork for many years, gave it everything while I was doing that. But my focus is totally on Clare.”

The first game to be played at the revamped Páirc Uí Chaoimh takes place Wednesday evening at 7.30pm, with the Intermediate Championship game between Blarney and Valley Rovers. Tickets are for sale at SuperValu outlets and will also be sold at ticket vans strategically placed around the stadium on the evening.