Hurling & Camogie

Clare call no surprise for Donal Og Cusack

Dessie Farrell, left, with Donal Og Cusack, Chairman of the GPA, at the Gaelic Players Association Annual General Meeting 2014
Dessie Farrell, left, with Donal Og Cusack, Chairman of the GPA, at the Gaelic Players Association Annual General Meeting 2014 Dessie Farrell, left, with Donal Og Cusack, Chairman of the GPA, at the Gaelic Players Association Annual General Meeting 2014

DONAL Og Cusack has revealed that he wasn’t shocked to receive a phonecall from Davy Fitzgerald asking him to come on board as Clare coach and selector.

The world of hurling was left wide-eyed with the news that the two old on-field foes were set to link up with the Banner county in 2016.

The two All-Ireland and Allstar winning goalkeepers are two massive personalities and they didn’t always see eye-to-eye.

But Cusack (right) said he knew what Clare boss Fitzgerald was calling about when he saw his number pop up on his phone a few months ago.

“I had a sense that was why he was ringing me,” said the former Cork net-minder.

“I don’t know; I just had that sense. I had a call and I missed it and I rang him back and we missed each other but I just had that sense.

“I have a very good friend and I told him Davy Fitz was looking for me and I said ‘I have a feeling he’s going to ask me to get involved with Clare.’

“So, when his number came up, I wasn’t (surprised).”

Cusack was speaking in Boston, where he is helping the Gaelic Players Association (GPA) promote tomorrow’s Fenway Hurling Classic between Dublin and Galway at Fenway Park, home of the Boston Red Sox.

It’s an 11-a-side game on a small pitch with goals-only allowed and already in excess of 20,000 tickets have been sold for the game at one of America’s oldest and most revered sports venues.

He met the players he will be working with next season last Friday and already he is looking forward to the challenge.

Clare won the 2013 All-Ireland, beating Cork after a replay, in fine style, though since then they have struggled, which is part of the reason Cusack has been brought in.

“I’ve been on record as saying I was a fan of how they played the game,” said Cusack.

“Style is personal, so everyone has their own tastes in terms of preferences on how the game should be played.

“But I would be a fan of that group and how they played the game in the last couple of years. I’m looking forward to learning about them.

“Davy doesn’t want yes men around him. I know we’ve got one definite common in place between the two of us; we both love the game.

“We sat down a couple of times. We spoke at length on a number of occasions. We spoke on the phone and we met face-to-face.

“We went through all different things you would obviously go through.”

Joining the Clare backroom team means Cusack has had to give up a lot, including playing club hurling, his role as GPA chairman and his seat on The Sunday Game’s hurling panel of analysts on RTE.

He says he was happy to move on from these and back into the world of the competitive inter-county game.

Possibly the biggest wrench for him was the decision to leave his position in the GPA, which he will vacate following the trip to Boston.

Cusack has long been a passionate advocate of players’ rights, he was to the forefront of a series of panel strikes in Cork, and he was a prime mover behind the growth of the GPA from a small outsider body to official GAA recognition.