WITH Patrick Horgan having retired, Mark Coleman sits just behind Séamus Harnedy in terms of experience in the Cork hurling squad.

BY JOHNNY CAROLAN

A teenage debutant, along with Shane Kingston, in the disappointing qualifier loss to Wexford in 2016, the Blarney man has seen a lot of ups and downs in his time on the panel.

It has been a decade with no shortage of criticism, not least regarding the team’s consistency.

Having made it to Sunday’s Allianz HL Division 1A decider against Limerick, Coleman feels that this is one charge that can no longer be raised as readily as it was.

‘Yeah, I suppose it's five finals in a row now at this stage, so that's definitely a good marker of consistency,’ he says.

‘It's probably a stick that we would have been beaten with for a long time, that lack of consistency, so I suppose getting to finals and hopefully winning them is a big thing for this group.’

A year ago, Cork were facing Tipperary, aiming to win the league for the first time in 27 years. Is the scenario different this time around?

‘Yeah, I suppose,’ Coleman says.

‘We probably hadn't won silverware in a long time before the one going in last year, whereas we have the two trophies from last year, so I suppose there isn't as big a hype around winning a trophy this year. So there's less pressure, if you want to say that.’

At the same time, facing the Treatymen at TUS Gaelic Grounds is not a task that gets any easier, even allowing for last year’s Munster final penalty shootout win.

‘I think, for us, it's obviously still going to be a massive challenge going up there.

‘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.’

Last year, of course, Cork were guided by Pat Ryan, whereas now Ben O’Connor is the man in charge. Coleman hasn’t found the new boss’s approach to be overly surprising.

‘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.’

And it seems like a group that almost enjoys having high demands made, as can be seen by the results.

‘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, so 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.’