Cork v Limerick: Mark Coleman blocking out the external noise

This year signals the tenth anniversary of Mark Coleman’s Cork senior debut.

While the successful Munster campaign of 2017 is associated with the emergence of Coleman, Shane Kingston, Darragh Fitzgibbon and Luke Meade, the Blarney man and Kingston saw game-time late in the defeat to Wexford in Thurles in 2016.

That season was Kieran Kingston’s first as manager and, including the Tracton man’s two stints, Ben O’Connor is the fifth new boss of Coleman’s inter-county career.

The Newtownshandrum native’s stint has gone well so far, aided by familiarity with those who played under him for the Cork U20 side. While Coleman had no prior experience of working with O’Connor, he had an idea of what lay ahead and that perception has materialised.

“It's kind of what I expected, to be honest,” he says.

“We knew the kind of person Ben was coming into it. Obviously, he's been involved with Midleton and Charleville and the U20s and stuff, so I think everybody knew the kind of character he was and that's exactly the way he's been since he came in with us.

“He's the same with us as he is with ye [media], just straight to the point and that's it. No, no surprises, just basically we get a lot of the same messages from every management team, it's just different ways of communicating it, so there was no surprise really.”

For a side often labelled with the inconsistency tag, Sunday’s league final against Limerick will represent a fifth straight decider for the Cork hurlers and so a manager like O’Connor, who seeks strong performances every day, is a good fit.

“Well, yeah, I think when you're playing for the Cork hurlers, there's always high demands,” Coleman says, “and there's always that kind of, I suppose, external noise that you have to deal with, whether you're going well or whether you're not going well.

“It’s something I suppose we're used to, and whether it's good, bad or indifferent, we kind of try and block it out and get on with what we have to do really.

“That's the way you have to do it in any high-performance environment, is try and just focus on the group ourselves and that's kind of what we've been doing the last few years anyway.”

And is it easy for Coleman to block out that external noise, given how easy it is for the critics to make themselves heard nowadays?

“No, not easy, but you to have to,” he says.

“I suppose, especially in this day and age with social media and all that, there's things that just get thrown up on your screen without even, you might just open your phone and there'll be something there, but you just have to kind of roll with it, and know that that's going to come with the territory and just do your best to not let it affect you.

“It probably comes easier for the older fellas, but it's the younger fellas who might struggle with it a bit. They might find it hard to walk away from it, but all you can do is just advise them and just say, look, it's all part of your territory, and we just focus on ourselves.

“All that matters is the opinions inside the four walls of the dressing room, so that's all we have to kind of keep telling fellas really.”

Winning silverware goes a long way to silencing the outside voices. Overcoming Limerick in last year’s Munster final at TUS Gaelic Grounds gives Cork confidence going up the N20 but, equally, it doesn’t make the test any easier.

“I think, for us, it's obviously still going to be a massive challenge going up there,” Coleman says.

“We’re under no illusions that it’s going to be a difficult day, or a difficult task, for us. After the Munster final, all it does is give you that bit of extra confidence.

“You're never going to be going in there with fear or anything like that, but you always draw from your past experiences.

“We were fortunate, I suppose very fortunate, to come out of there last year after penalties. It’s never going to be an easy day up there, but I suppose just that bit of confidence off the back of last year, maybe but it's obviously still going to be a difficult task any time you go up to the Gaelic Grounds.”