Kerry star to reveal how management teams shine

KERRY senior football manager Jack O’Connor will be one of the keynote speakers at a Clare Sports Partnership-organised seminar next Wednesday.

KERRY senior football manager Jack O’Connor will be one of the keynote speakers at a Clare Sports Partnership-organised seminar next Wednesday.
Entitled Preparing for Competition, the conference will be held in the Auburn Lodge Hotel, Ennis.
The seminar will look at the different areas for consideration, when teams or individuals are preparing to compete in sport. The Kerry manager will talk about different aspects relating to preparing a team for competition.
Speaking to The Clare Champion this week, Jack O’Connor said trying to create a set-up where individuals work together in a team environment is one of the keys to management.
“Every team you take over has different individuals. It’s all about handling guys as individuals. You can’t paint them all with the same brush because they’re different characters and some react to different methods. So  you have to treat them as individuals and manage them in that regard,” he explained.
“It’s basically all about gelling them into a team. By and large, when they start off they all want to play their own game but your job as a manager and a coach is to gel them into playing as a team and emphasise the team ethic all the time. That’s the critical thing and that’s what every manager is trying to do,” the South Kerry man added.
Kerry currently sit on eight points at the top of the NFL Division 1. The only game they have lost so far was at home to Armagh, while the beaten All-Ireland finalists have used the league to blood several young players, including Barry John Keane, Paddy Curtin, Brian McGuire and Peter Crowley.
“We felt last year that our panel wasn’t as strong as it could have been when push came to shove. We were adamant this year that we were going to try and find three or four new players who would be competitive and who would either make a claim for starting or at least be in the frame to come on. So I think the league has served us well so far,” O’Connor reflected.
However, he acknowledged  the best way to introduce younger players to the inter-county scene is to surround them with experienced footballers.
“The older fellas have been through the ropes before and they can guide the other fellas. You can’t put too many in together because they just wouldn’t have the confidence to turn it on straight away. There’s very few who come right out of minor. There’s only a handful that spring to mind, the likes of The Gooch maybe or Jimmy Barry Murphy, who came straight out of minor and made it. There’s a couple of years of an apprenticeship. We’ve a few fellas now who are just gone 21, who are certainly trying to stake a claim,” he said.
Losing last year’s All-Ireland final to Dublin hurt Kerry badly, which is a source of huge motivation to the Kingdom in 2012.
“Losing an All-Ireland hurts for an awful long time and you’d be hoping that fellas would harness that hurt in the proper way but if I had the choice of winning one or losing one, I know which one I’d take,” the All-Ireland winning manager concluded.
Seán O’Meara, who is physiotherapist to the Clare senior football team will talk about the significance of screening players at the seminar. He will give a practical demonstration. A representative from Shannon Cryotherapy Clinic will discuss injury prevention and cryotherapy as a means to recovery, while Irish international race-walker Colin Griffin will talk about the strength and commitment required by an athlete to reach and compete at the top level of sport.
The seminar will start at 7pm. Tickets can be obtained from Clare Sports Partnership on 065 6865434 or info@claresportspartnership.ie. See www.claresportspartnership.ie further information.