Seeing light at the end of the tunnel

Interview: Keith Duggan talks to Ken Hogan, the Tipperary manager, asthe shadow boxing ends and the real action starts.

Ken Hogan has the perfect phrase for the early stages of the hurling league - shadow boxing. He has the goalkeeper's intuition for when his patch is going to get busy.

Now that he has assumed the hot seat in Tipperary hurling after working in both the Fr Tom Fogarty and Nicky English administrations, he is well accustomed to the comparatively bloodless and serene experiences of the first Sundays of any new season.

Tipperary are sitting prettily in the league table but Hogan is not about to declare himself delighted. He is not deriding his first games in charge, it is just he feels - knows - this is an untidy period when all teams are caught up in their own distractions as much as with match days.

"In a strange way, the most satisfying game was the one we lost against Offaly. It was our first game and the result was not perfect, but it was the quality of the game and I was pleased with the way we competed. After that, we met teams with different agendas - Wexford and Antrim were severely depleted for various reasons and Limerick had very little hurling done when we played. So in a way I think the league only truly starts on Sunday."

A drive to Páirc Uí Chaoimh always carries a heavy resonance for Tipperary teams, but although Hogan expects their game against the Munster champions to genuinely fizz, he also reckons it has fallen at the right time.

"It's just the new time. The 3.30 p.m. start and the extra daylight and the feeling that the ball is running on top of the ground and just the general sense that people are coming out of the wintertime hibernation. It all means light at the end of the tunnel for the players and that in turn affects the quality of the league games."

When Michael Doyle was abruptly replaced after one season in charge, Hogan was the obvious choice for new broom. Since retiring from the Tipperary team a decade ago, he has been a constant back-room face communicating the same calm assurance and paternal authority with which he marshalled the county's All-Ireland winning full-back lines of 1989 and 1991.

Although he learned a lot while working with Fogarty and English, the way Tipperary's season unravelled last year, ending with a semi-final memorable only for Kilkenny's rampant second-half performance, has illustrated how thin the line is.

Nobody could legislate for Philly Maher, masterful at full back and the bulwark of the Tipperary defence, suddenly just gone from the equation. And nobody predicted the pyrotechnics in the National League final against Kilkenny that Tipperary appeared to have won twice over before finally running out of bullets.

And a fortnight later, meeting a Clare team caught up in rhapsodic mood for a game of ferocious intensity, a game that sapped them. Ken Hogan watched all this and it hammered home how fragile the thread of success can be.

"I think Tipperary were a lot closer than people recognised last year. I hear people talk about the All-Ireland semi-final. But it was much before that; the period between the league final and the early rounds of the championship were a shock to the system. So what I would hope is that we get a bit of luck this time round and that injuries don't blight our season. And that the players express themselves as we know they are capable of doing on the field."

Hogan is a players' manager. Like English, he believes that, ultimately, it comes down to what happens between the lines. His primary role is to prepare the players so that no team they will meet has an edge in terms of fitness or any other intangible.

And also, to make certain they are a happy bunch; that they feel they are being looked after properly. Given the demands made of intercounty squads, he believes it is a courtesy as much as anything.

And working as a physical education instructor in the Garda College in Templemore has kept him in tune with the conflicting demands and pressures on young people.

"The environment is just so much faster. And then intercounty players have the added complexity of trying to tailor their careers or college courses or exams around the training regime we set out for them. So I think it's important that we try and make things as smooth as possible for them."

It has changed radically since Hogan's own playing days. That said, when he was in his 20s, life wasn't exactly a stroll in the park.

Being stationed as a garda in Pearse Street from 1983 to 1989 had its demands: there were nights when the job was every bit as nerve-racking as the charged Munster final campaign of 1987 that marked Tipperary's renaissance after an extraordinary low period.

Hogan hightailed up and down from Dublin city to Thurles through all those years and knew what tiredness and sacrifice was. He missed out, jettisoned himself from friends at home, cut himself out of much of the social side of station life and spent his free hours trying to catch up on rest.

Living in Dublin was an utter contrast to his formative years in Lorrha, a Tipperary village locked hard on the borders of Offaly and Galway. He was in Joe Dooley's class in school in Birr and the town was always the social hub for everyone from Lorrha.

Hurling was central to his life from his earliest recollection: his father, Hubie, played for Tipperary and had a distinguished refereeing career, taking charge of the 1952 All-Ireland final.

The game was everything to him but even as he was enjoying his best years, its demands were apparent. It is a lifestyle choice and he admires the kids today who have the discipline to want to extract the most from their talent. As he sees it, his role is to facilitate and encourage that.

"I don't think there is any great difference in what I do now as manager to when I trained or was a selector. There is a management team in place. Ultimately, I call the shots and the buck stops here. So people looking in probably regard my role as a lot more pressurised or whatever.

"On the sideline, you react to situations as they emerge and you know you have to stay calm when you are presented with the unpredictable."

He shared in those moments with both Fr Tom and Nicky. Some days they escaped with their skins, others ended in massive disappointment. Working with Fr Tom, he was probably a little more circumspect because he made the leap from team to management with no real breathing space.

With English, it was a clean slate, only John Leahy and Declan Ryan remained from the 1991 All-Ireland champions. Ten years later, when Tipperary came good again, English emphasised the importance of persistence and patience, qualities that are sometimes hard bought in Tipperary.

Most of that championship team are now training under Hogan. He believes in them unreservedly and wants to guarantee they can hurl with the same streak of colour and confidence as three years ago.

"We know we are a bit behind the teams such as Kilkenny and Cork in reality. And the championship is a minefield. But we are keen to do ourselves justice this year and hurl the way we know we can. Then it is down to a matter of getting the breaks."