O'Donnell delights in Harty Cup victory to add to incredible year for Nenagh CBS

“It’s unbelievable,” was how winning Nenagh CBS manager Donach O’Donnell put it after Saturday’s incredible finish in Cusack Park.

“It’s usually hard to switch off, but after the whistle went it was impossible to switch off.”

“It was an unbelievable way to win a match. In fairness to them (players), they are such a good bunch because they’ve been doing this all year.

All year, there have been times when the CBS were up against it, even as recently as the semi-final win over Charleville CBS where a late goal was the winning of the game. O’Donnell lauded the players and highlighted that they have been in that position before and they were well versed in keeping plugging away based on their games and training all year.

“They’ve stayed in matches when they shouldn’t have been in them. They’ve always chipped away and put their heads down,” he said.

“We always talk about the half-hook and the half-block, and the half touch, getting the foot in but yet again, it came down to that in the last few minutes.

“They kept plugging. We’ve gone over these things in training so often. Obviously, not in front of goals but we’ve done it so often in training and we’ve hardwired it into and they are so selfless as a group.

“They don’t mind doing the hard work for the guy beside them and it is a testament to them.”

Like other games in this campaign also, different players stepped up to the mantle at different times and the double marking of Nenagh CBS talisman Darragh McCarthy meant that there was space for others to thrive and that was something the management team planned for in the lead up to the game.

Players like Eoin Doughan and Austin Duff made real hay up front while Mason Cawley had a terrific game at centre forward and O’Donnell highlighted the fact that McCarthy took a lot of the watching which allowed his teammates to fill their boots.

“Yeah, one hundred percent,” he acknowledged.

“They were double marking Darragh and he was being pulled and dragged a bit and when he is being double marked, that means a man is free and the guys know that and Darragh doesn’t mind taking the punishment for others. 

“Again, that is something that has been happening all year.”

In all reality, the fact that Nenagh CBS went in at the break level with a more dominant Ardscoil Rís was a huge boost for the underdogs who were under real pressure from the sharpshooting of Limerick U20 hurler Fintan Fitzerald had the Nenagh defence caught between a rock and a hard place according to O’Donnell.

To shore up the defence and cut out those shots around the 45 and midfield, Ciaran Foley was moved to centre back with Jake Hackett moving to midfield and it certainly shored them up in this regard and gave a lot of solidity.

“Jake (Hackett) was just getting caught a bit between coming and going a little bit and Ciaran (Foley) is very good to sit and then we moved him back there later on in the game.

“They were very good to adapt. We’ve done it so much over the year in training and matches this year, bringing fellas in and out and you always can discover something about a player.

“We’re learning all the time.

The journey started way back in August for this panel of players when they sat down to plan their assault on this year’s competition, and O’Donnell remembered a time when the players didn’t believe they could be in this position and that belief needed to be instilled.

“I remember I had a chat with three or four of the lads in the dressing room one day and they were saying it would be ‘the dream’ and we said to them that it’s there for them if they want it.

“Gradually, they started to believe it and we showed them video and went through stuff about winning games in challenge matches, trying lads in new positions and eventually we ended up improving, and that brought them huge confidence.”

The journey doesn’t end yet for this Nenagh CBS team who will now face the Croke Cup All-Ireland Colleges series where they will face the Leinster schools runners-up in a few weeks, but O’Donnell said that the Harty is “the one” and that they can now face into the rest of the campaign with a monkey off their backs.

“Definitely. And particularly given that it’s been 10 or 11 years since we’ve been there and the last time we were in it we ended up winning the All-Ireland.

“But we had no Harty and the Harty Cup is the one.

“If you don’t win the Harty you’ll always look back and say the year wasn’t as successful,” he finished.