WHILE the primary focus is on helping Cork to end a 21-year wait for an All-Ireland SHC, Ben O’Connor has already seen one wait end this year as a fan.

BY JOHNNY CAROLAN

When the Newtownshandrum man lifted the Liam MacCarthy Cup as Cork captain in September 2004, Arsenal, the English football team that he supports, were the champions of England but few could have imagined that it would take until this year for them to follow that.

Cork and O’Connor retained their title in 2005 but since then the counter has only moved upwards. Whether they win or lose against Limerick in Sunday’s Munster SHC final at Páirc Uí Chaoimh (2pm), the Rebels will be still be in the top two in most rankings for the All-Ireland, having impressed since O’Connor succeeded.

Despite having won their first three round-robin games, they still needed something from the last match, at home to Clare on May 24th, to secure a place in the final – with the Premier League ending that afternoon too, it might have been a fraught afternoon for O’Connor had Arsenal’s battle with Manchester City gone to the last day but they were champions with a game to spare.

‘It was great,’ O’Connor says.

‘The first day above in Tipperary, we were having a bite to eat in the dressing room and (Shane) Barrett sat down alongside me with a big smile on his face. He said, “City are after beating Arsenal,” and he was delighted with it. I said to him, “Barrett, that'll make no difference, Arsenal will still win the league,” and that's what happened.

‘But it was great. For Arsenal to win the league after 22 years and us to qualify for a Munster final, it was a good day out. The small fellas were happy going home in the car anyway.’

Are there any parallels to be drawn between Cork and Arsenal?

‘They're multi-millionaires, we're not – there aren't many parallels to draw there!’ O’Connor laughs.

‘They're all getting paid for what they're doing and we're here for enjoyment purposes. No, look, it just shows, Arsenal had been written off and they went on and won the league this year.

‘It just gives everyone a bit of hope.’

If the analogy is to be stretched, Limerick are Cork’s Manchester City, the powerful machine that must be overcome.

O’Connor has no shortage of admiration for what John Kiely has built.

‘They've kept it going so long,’ he says.

‘They've been there for the last ten or 12 years and it's hard to keep that going. It's a lot of the same players that they've had and they're able to keep it going.

‘They play to a system that suits them, they don't change it for anyone. They just do what they do and they stick to that. They believe in that and it has obviously been working for them.’

Essentially, they are a team without a weakness.

‘It's just everything,’O’Connor says.

‘It's physically, but I suppose the most impressive thing is mentally. To think that they've been that successful but they're still driving on... trying to drive yourself to keep going is the hard side of it and they seem to be able to do that with no problem at all.’

But of course Cork go into Sunday’s match having already beaten Limerick, winners by two points at the same venue at the end of April.

It was the second time in the round-robin era that a team has gone four from four. Tipperary in 2019 were the other example – while they won the All-Ireland, Limerick beat them in the Munster final, showing just how hard it is to win every match.

‘Yeah. And the other side of that is you have a bit of momentum with four games won,’ O’Connor says.

‘But we know that Sunday is the biggest game that we're going to play this year and that's the way we treat every game. It's always about the next game with us.

‘There's going to be a big Cork crowd and a big Limerick crowd. It's going to be a fierce battle but our boys are ready for it. This is where we wanted to be at the start of the year, inside in the thick of it. You saw the last day, the sun shining, 24 or 25 degrees, a big crowd in and around the place, a great atmosphere... that's what these fellas are bred for, that's what they're training for.

‘I said we've been training since November but a lot of these fellas are actually training for the last ten years with no break at all. They just keep coming back and keep coming back. It's for the big days. And they don't happen that often – it's a short career.’