Nicky English Interview dated Wednesday 5th of December 2001
Last December, Premierview, Mulcair, and Ed Donnelly of the official Tipperary GAA website enjoyed an experience which had many a defender tearing his hair out over the years - an hour and a bit in the company of Nicky English ! Nicky proved to be sparkling company and would talk hurling all day long, which suited us just fine! As they say in Tipp "the sliothars were flying" for about an hour and a half, and the interview you are about to read is the result of our conversation.
We would like to thank Nicky for his approachability and courtesy at all times. It is said that you should never meet your hero, as you'll inevitably be disappointed; but we can say that this old adage certainly didn't hold true in this case. It was obvious during our conversation that while Nicky has been a successful player and manager with Tipp, he remains first and foremost a Tipperary supporter.
By adding a managerial All-Ireland title to his many playing achievements, Nicky further copper-fastened his already assured place in the pantheon of Tipperary hurling greats. No doubt his views will be of great interest to all Tipperary people. We hope you enjoy reading the interview, as much as we enjoyed compiling it.
Premierview :
Did you enjoy the whole All-Ireland experience, the build-up, the actual game?
Nicky :
In the run up to the game, Anne and I were moving house so we had a lot on our plate, which took away to some degree from the constant thinking about the match. At the Wednesday night training session before the final, there was a massive crowd there, and I was concerned that the whole thing could go way over the top like I thought it did in 1988. I was very conscious of avoiding that. On the day of the match everyone was very relaxed, as relaxed as we possibly could have been. I felt quite confident that if we got into a close game that we would win.
I thought that when Mark O'Leary got his goal in the second half that we would have to win, as we were getting every break that was going. The only time I felt a bit dodgy was when Galway got the goal. I though that this was a dangerous time, but still we were getting points consistently, every time they scored we got the next one, so it relaxed us again. When the timekeeper put four minutes up, it was a very nerve-wracking experience as well. Other than those moments, I was comfortable enough all throughout, but to be honest hearing the final whistle was a major relief.
Premierview :
You mentioned in the TV interview after the final whistle that you were "out of a hole". Did you feel that degree of pressure?
Nicky :
I knew the first day when I took the job I was going in to a hole. That's the nature of being a manager of any inter-county team, the Tipp job particularly. I was taking a chance. I suppose I had a certain reputation as a player and I was throwing that aside and going down to start at the bottom again. When I was approached about the job, I discussed it with people, and some even advised me against taking the job. But it was a job I just couldn't turn my back on no matter how hard I tried. When the final whistle went after the All-Ireland Final, which was the culmination of our efforts, I felt relief more than anything else. That was the main emotion.
Premierview :
Would it have been hard for the team to come back next year if we had lost the All-Ireland Final?
Nicky :
I think the Munster final would have been a more dangerous one to lose in that regard. I think you always need to have progression and development within a team. I was more anxious about the Munster Final. If we had lost, that would have stalled our “progress”. We knew how hard it was going to be coming through the back door. We knew that from the previous year. If we had lost the quarter-final, then we had regressed. But once we won the Munster final there was progression anyway, whatever happened after that.
Also we were so well prepared this year, that it would have thrown us a lot if we had lost the Munster Final. Last year we could clearly identify what went wrong between the Munster Final and the All-Ireland Quarter-Final, but in 2001 unless bad luck or a better team was going to beat us, we knew we weren't going to lose because we played badly.
I was pretty confident that we would play to the same consistent standard in every match. This was reassuring coming up to the All-Ireland Final as well. Galway had played only one really competitive match. I thought on the day that Galway played great against Kilkenny, but when I watched the video afterwards I had no doubt that Tipp could beat them. I was fairly sure of what way Tipp were going to play, but you couldn't be as sure what way Galway were going to play as they had only played one major match.
Premierview :
You retired as a player in 1996, and became manager just two years later. Did you find the fact that you were a player so recently an advantage or a disadvantage when you became manager?
Nicky :
It was both an advantage and a disadvantage to be honest. It was a disadvantage in the sense that I had to deal with players I had played with, which is awkward enough. Particularly so at the stage that some of them were at, as they were getting to the latter days. I suppose the advantage was recently experiencing what players appreciate and want from management, so there were two sides of it to be honest. I think for me in the decision-making process as to whether to take the job, the former (the disadvantage) was playing on my mind a good bit. I thought that maybe if you gave it more of a gap then you wouldn't have to deal with former colleagues. Someone else would have to do that job, and that it would have been easier for me, but that's all history now.
Premierview :
Would you consider that your eventual successor would benefit from working with the outgoing management team, like they have done in Cork with the likes of Tom Cashman and Bertie Og Murphy, or is a fresh face and a fresh approach a better option?
Nicky :
I don't have a view on that. I think if the day comes that you identify a successor, you should just go anyway. I'd have to say as a player myself, a fresh voice is very important. There needs to be a fresh voice or a fresh approach all the time, Otherwise it just becomes routine or mundane, and it's just not going to work. The more variety there is the better.
Personally I believe that there's plenty of people that can manage the Tipperary team. Obviously from a personal view it would have been better for me to go after the All-Ireland final. However,I don't view the job in a selfish way. I'm just there to do a bit, when I think my bit is done and I can go no further, I will leave it up to other people to get the successor. It's not a manager's job to pick a successor; it's the county board's job. If a manager gets that powerful he should be turfed out anyway.
Premierview :
What do you think is the ideal agreed term for a county team manager at the outset, a term that doesn't put undue pressure on either the management or county board ? Would you favour a three year arrangement as seems to happen in many counties, or perhaps the Offaly model where they do it on a year-to-year basis, so no matter what happens everyone knows where they stand?
Nicky :
We had three years at the beginning, and now it's effectively year to year. Generally, I suppose the same thing won't suit everybody. A lot depends on whether there's a perceived progression in the team. I don't think we as a management team did come under pressure in the first two years. Maybe it helped that we were on a three-year term, that people did not panic, and say that we need do something here because they haven't won the All Ireland.
It's unrealistic to expect that in current competitive hurling that you are going to win an All Ireland every three years. We in Tipp have to wise up to that fact; if we don't we're not going to compete at the level we can. We have to be realistic about things. We start at the bottom every year, and we need our team firing on all cylinders. We must be competitive, and at worst be hard to beat, then in the years that we deserve a break we should get them, and that's what happened in 2001.
Premierview :
Do you feel there's undue pressure in Tipp with regard to expectation?
Nicky :
I think it has improved a lot. But I see it as equally important in the context of the Tipperary team itself, to have our fans as prepared as our team. The days when our supporters go to games expecting to win, are traditionally the days when Tipp are most vulnerable. I can go back to my time, 1990 Munster final, 1996 Munster final. On Munster final day 2000, our fans were not prepared for battle.
I think the atmosphere that day got through to the players. Nobody was prepared for the match, the supporters thought there was going to be a concert and this seeped through to the team. This year the supporters were feeling the pressure more. We did not have great vocal support for the Limerick game this year, but it's not that we had a low turn-out of supporters; its just that the supporters weren't there with fire in their bellies as they were filled with anxiety and a fear of losing. They couldn't open their mouths. Limerick supporters and team had nothing to lose, they were on a roll, and that made it even more difficult for Tipp to win. If you take the second game against Wexford, I'm sure we had a much smaller crowd than the first day, but the Tipp vocal support at the replay was coming out over the stand. It makes a huge difference to the team, I know what it's like for a player. I played in '96 against Limerick in the Gaelic Grounds when you would have had the same number of supporters from both counties, but the Tipp support in the second half was dead when Limerick started coming at us.
Is there too much expectation in Tipperary? I don't think so anymore, I hope not either, but the support is important to players.
Premierview :
Nicky, you played under many good managers as a player, people like Babs Keating, Fr Michael O'Brien, who would you say has had most influence on your own style of management?
Nicky :
I think you just take the best from everybody, we're all basically imitators. I took the best from everybody and tried to develop my own style. I think Babs in the Tipperary context brought a lot to it, he was prepared to go outside the norm, rather to just do it the way all others had done it before. He was prepared to get a supporters club, have blazers, make things stand out. In the Tipperary context I brought more from him than any other manager I have seen.
Premierview :
How important was it for you as a player having played during the bad times '82-'86 to be in a successful Tipperary team in the late '80s?
Nicky :
The bad times were not as bad as they are maybe portrayed. There were many close games; years where we were as good as anybody if we got the same breaks. It wasn't like we were miles off the pace.
I think that Babs changed things, the approach; so you felt that there was more value and glamour in playing for Tipperary at that stage. At the same time it took nearly three years to win the All Ireland, even though a lot of us had fair grounding before that.
If you look back, we played a Munster final in 1984 with the same kind of hype as they had last year. In 1985 we did the same and didn't do it. In '87 when we got to Croke Park, 90% of the team didn't play. We came back in '88 in an All Ireland Final we didn't play at all. They often say you have to lose one before you win one, but losing can make it more difficult to come back too. I think it was Jimmy Barry Murphy that said it's as easy to win your first All-Ireland as your last. By losing those matches maybe we made it harder for ourselves to win it a few years later.
Premierview :
Is the role or importance of the manager sometimes over-stated?
Nicky :
My view is that a good manager doesn't make a huge amount of difference, but a bad one will kill off a team's drive, and ultimately their chances. Obviously the manager needs to be smart but the team needs to develop itself as well. Our fellows learnt more in the last two years through defeat than anything else. Only if they are smart enough to realise that they did make mistakes, and try to do something about them, are they in a position to win. If you take our team last year, they hadn't played in a Munster final or they hadn't played in Croke Park. Last year they did both, and both were bad experiences for them. By this year, they had learnt from the things they had done wrong. There were things we needed to change. Ultimately, players have to have to capacity to learn and improve. The manager's role is largely to influence that development, and make sure the team is picking up the correct principles. There's only so much a manager can do.
Premierview :
You made some good additions to the panel this year, Premierview was behind you in the dug-out this year when you played Waterford in the League in Nenagh and could not help noticing your appreciation of Lar Corbett. Was this the player you were looking for in the League?
Nicky :
There were very few players who could do what he did that day. I think hurling is a very simple game; the better your first touch, the better player you're going to be. All the great players I have ever seen had a great first touch and he has that, and he did show it that day.
He was the kind of player we were looking for. Our last game before the present season was the All-Ireland Quarter-Final against Galway, and the one thing I took from that was that we needed to change our approach up front. I felt that we were still very individual and that we also lacked leadership in that game. Certainly one other major thing we lacked was pace. To me there's no substitute for pace, that first couple of yards can be the difference. The first day we saw Lar Corbett was in the South-East League against Clare, and I thought he has the one thing we are looking for and that is pace, he had the all the raw ingredients, but the main thing is he had pace. 2002 will be a tough year for him but if he develops physically and continues to improve he will be a serious threat to opposing teams.
Premierview :
Hurling in the last ten years has become a lot more demanding in fitness terms. Would you like to be starting your career in modern hurling and all the fitness requirements that goes with it?
Nicky :
I'd love to be able to start again! Every sport is always going to evolve and get better. The 100 metres record is never going to get slower. Sport gets better, people get bigger and stronger and they certainly get faster. If it involves more training then that's the way it is.
It's the same in any walk of life or in business. If you were to adhere to health and safety regulations, or work practices that were twenty years old, your business would probably be closed down! It doesn't mean they weren't very good at the time, but thing always keep evolving. The bar keeps being raised. That's the nature of things.
I think if you are ambitious to play hurling, you'll just have to come to the standard of the day.
Premierview :
There’s always debate comparing teams and players of different eras. How would the likes of John Doyle survive in the modern game in your opinion?
Nicky :
I have no doubt he would survive very easily. I think John Doyle would be a magnificent player today, because he had the desire to be that in his day, and still would today.
It's difficult to compare different eras anyway. For example, take the '87 Munster final replay in Killarney, it is meant to be one of the best games we played. But if you watch that game on video it does not seem that good. To me it looks slow and scrappy compared to what we see today. I think if you look back at a match on video outside the context of the time, you will often see a different game to what you thought it was. However, the great players or athletes of any era would still be great in other times as they would have the desire, and therefore would come to the required standard of the day and beyond.
Premierview :
The Tipperary team you played in under Babs is often accused of under-achieving. Do you think that's a fair comment, or is it just the product of ridiculous expectation levels again?
Nicky :
Maybe it's a little bit to do with expectation levels. There might be a case we could have won it in '88 or we could have won it in '90, depending on different circumstances. It's difficult to say what is a reasonable level of achievement, because in a team’s development the older they get the more things they have on their plates themselves. Sometimes people don't realise that when they point to the average age of a team and say a team is not "old". By 1991 a lot of us were pushing on into the late twenties, a lot of fellows were married, or more involved in business. Lots of different factors make it more difficult as player’s circumstances change. I suppose 1990 would be the one that stood out for me as the one we should have won. We walked in with our mouths open, we went in as red-hot favourites. Couldn't be beaten. Cork were useless etc. and bang, we were hit by a train. Nobody was prepared for it.
Premierview :
Would there be a feeling the 1990 team was poorly selected, John Leahy at full forward and Pat Fox being substituted?
Nicky :
To be honest, I couldn't believe the team that was picked that day. Having said that, there were a lot of the players after '89 that weren't playing as well as they should have been either. I don't necessarily think that the Babs should shoulder all of the blame. We as players couldn't say we played well on the day.
I think its too simplistic to blame Babs, while he seems to get the blame. Yet he left himself open for it with several decisions that were made. At the same time the players had to shoulder it as well, because the same hunger was not there in '90 as there was in '89; not even close. The team that played in July '90, had been on the road in '87,'88, and '89. Why did Kilkenny lose this year? You could not say it was bad selection choices, I think it boiled down to hunger.
You can look back at various years and say we should have won more, then on the other hand you could say we were very lucky to win '91. The chances are if we had won in '90, you wouldn't even get us out of the train the following year! I think two All Irelands is a fair achievement for any team.
Premierview :
Following on from that mention of Babs in 1990, a lot is made of management teams and their decisions, but you mentioned a few times this year that it is about what happens "between the white lines". Do you think people should realise that ultimately that is where it happens?
Nicky :
I believe so anyway. On match day there is very little you can do, even though the public will give you massive credit for moves if your team wins, and castigate you for maybe the same changes if your team loses. In my view, ultimately the game is about players and all the big decisions are made inside the white lines.
Premierview :
In your book "Beyond the Tunnel", you mentioned that winning the '87 Munster final was the highlight of your career, would this years All-Ireland win match it or even surpass it?
Nicky :
I think as a player, the 1987 Munster final was the highlight, the most exciting. But in terms of sheer relief nothing would compare with the final whistle this year, just purely in terms of relief, not just achievement. I couldn't believe when the final whistle went. I don't consider myself the luckiest person in the world in many respects, but we had every bit of luck that was going then. For the feeling of achievement it would be hard to beat 1987, but for the significance of a single moment, the final whistle in the 2001 match is unsurpassed.
Premierview :
You played your club hurling with Lattin-Cullen, a Junior/Intermediate
club all your career. Do you ever wish you had the chance to play with a
more successful club in Tipperary and play for the Dan Breen Cup?
Nicky :
Not really, no. Our ambitions were certainly never about that, or my personal ambitions were never about that. I never expected that we could be in a position to do that. We did have amalgamation teams in our time. We joined with Golden and Annacarty, and we had as good as chance of winning the Dan Breen cup as any club in the West. We had a super team, but could not get past the first round. We did not have the same team ethic as successful club teams.
I have strong views on whether you should change clubs. There were a number of times I could have considered it, in Cork particularly. But in my view, changing clubs can most times get people into a bit of hassle. Ultimately no matter how badly you play with your own club, they know you, they know your family, they know reasons why you might have played badly, or the reasons why you couldn't play well on a particular day. They accept that, and they will back you regardless.
If you go to another club there is rarely the same loyalty factor. They're probably wondering why you changed clubs in the first place. You're only there really to play well; you're not there to be a born and bred club member. That's the way I viewed it anyway. I don't have any regrets, because at the end of the day I wouldn't have really considered it.
Premierview :
Do you think it would be of benefit to the county to have " permanent" amalgamations in predominantly Junior/Intermediate hurling areas of Tipperary, such as they have in Cork ? A system which would give good players who come from smaller clubs, the ability to aspire to playing regularly at the highest level of club hurling.
Nicky :
The more competitive you can make club hurling in Tipperary - whatever way you do it - the better it would be for the county team. The less the gap between club and county the better. Whatever way you achieve that, I would be in favour of it.
I think we must reduce the amount of senior clubs, and make everybody competitive at the next level. The relegation policy of the county board will help I think, as it will reduce the number of senior clubs. The less senior clubs in Tipp the better, it means you have to reach a higher standard to be up in the top division.
We have a fairly traditional structure in that we still have divisions, which makes regulating the number of teams at each grade more difficult. The county league has tried to move it away from that.
Premierview :
With the current crop of GAA books on the market, can we expect a new version of your book "Beyond the Tunnel" updated with your managerial career? If Vincent Hogan rang you, would you consider it?
Nicky :
No, there is a major difference between writing a book as a player and writing a book as a selector or manager, I think to write a book which wouldn’t be bland - as a manager - you have to give views on individual players and I wouldn't do that. I don't think it would be fair or worth it.
Premierview :
So you are of the opinion what is said in the dressing room stays in the dressing room?
Nicky :
In general I think the media in Ireland in latter years have used a bit too much sensationalism, and because of that managers and players have pulled back a bit from it. This is a pity because it means the public gets less of an insight into what goes on, and everybody suffers. It is exciting and everybody should have an idea what goes on.
It would be good to see general information available to all supporters, but maybe some of the media have abused the privilege a bit. It needs to come back to where it was. From my point of view, in the build-up to the All-Ireland we felt that the players deserved as much attention as they were getting. If they can’t handle this little pressure they shouldn't be on the team in the first place.
Premierview :
In 1988 you assumed the captaincy from Pa O’Neill with all the controversy that surrounded it, the main reason being the unwritten rule that the county champions pick the captain. Would you be in favour of retaining that “rule”, or would you like to see selectors picking the captain as in some other counties?
Nicky :
I think we have to get away from that rule as it has caused a lot of trouble. Ultimately it has impacted on our chances, either through players being on the team as they had to be captain or otherwise.
It has to be changed, the way to possibly do it is to put a time-frame on it, like saying we will change it three years time, and then nobody has a problem,as who knows who will be county champions then and things shouldn’t get parochial.
Saying that, Tommy Dunne is the probably as good a captain we have ever had, Tommy would be captain whether Toomevara won the county championship or not. It’s just pure luck that he is captain because Toomevara are county champions.
Premierview :
Declan Carr made a comeback in '99, successfully playing in the League Final victory. Despite this, he didn't feature against Clare in the championship. This was quite a talking point at the time. What was the thinking behind not playing him in the game against Clare?
Nicky :
In hindsight, it probably was a mistake to be honest. I think the biggest mistake was that he was not put on as sub the first day against Clare. The biggest regret about that game against Clare in '99 was that we did not use our subs wisely. Now we make substitutions as a matter of course. By minute 60 or 61 or whatever, we're bringing on a fresh player almost no matter how the team is playing. I think in that first game against Clare - had we used him - Declan would have brought us home. The original thinking was we were going to go at a million miles an hour, which we did.
Premierview :
Was this why Brendan Cummins kept pucking the ball out immediately?
Nicky:
Yes, we wanted to play like that, bang bang bang.
Premierview :
Did you feel that confident about the fitness of the team?
Nicky :
Oh yeah, plus we knew nobody had done that before. Clare couldn't have been ready for that the first day. We had a young fit team. There was a worry with the two Declans - could we go that pace with both of them? It was part of the game-plan more than anything else. We had the same game-plan for the replay - to play at a million miles an hour again for 15, 20 minutes and then bring in Declan Ryan to guide the ship home. But by the time we brought him in, the game was already lost. We learnt a lot of lessons that day, hard lessons.
Premierview :
In the interview immediately after the All-Ireland Final you spoke about "going away from the style" on previous occasions during your managerial tenure. Does it give you great satisfaction to have won an All Ireland putting your own stamp on the team's style of play?
Nicky :
When we came in to manage the Tipp team we looked at what was being successful around at that time, which is all you can do. What was being successful at the time we came in was very fit teams such as Clare. We had been out of it for a few years, so it crossed our minds that things may have changed. We had not won one since '91, when we won in '89 and '91 we had started new types of training and were fitter than most teams around at that time. I think Tipp and Galway at the time brought it on a lot.
That initial impression we had in '99 was probably wrong. Clare weren't winning just because they were the fittest team, they were winning because they were the best team. They had the best full-back, the best centre-back, two of the best midfielders around, and one of the best forwards probably of all-time. We had the impression that in '98 the team was maybe not fit enough and in '99 we decided that whatever happened we wouldn't be beaten by fitness. Later on with the type of team we had we felt we needed to adopt a new style. This year we didn't lack for fitness either, as our starting point was that the team would be fit anyway.
I think our hurling was better this year. In training we did concentrate more on first touch and hurling, but our team now was better able to take chances. They had been there before and rushed shots. Now the emphasis was being able to pick a player in a better position and make good decisions on the ball rather than shooting on sight and taking Hail Mary pots at goal. There were a number of instances of bad decision-making in the Munster final of 2000 for example, when I think we had twelve wides in the first half. That day because players had missed so many scoreable chances earlier, they were afraid to go for some easy chances later. But it was as much the team naturally developing, and individual players getting more comfortable with their roles within the team, as any training ground moves.
Premierview :
The movement of John Carroll to centre forward is seen by many people as potentially the move that took Tipp from just another contender to eventual All Ireland Champions. Do you consider that a very significant move? And was it something the selectors had it mind for a while or did it just happen spontaneously?
Nicky :
He certainly had played in the forwards for us before. At the start of the League against Derry, John played full forward, and against Wexford in Thurles, he was centre forward. We view John as being an exceptional player who could play anywhere, wherever the need is greatest.
We had been a long time blessed with Declan Ryan centre forward. We never even had to think about it; Declan was going to be centre forward and that was it. In 2001 after Declan's injury problems the previous year, it didn't look likely that Declan was going to be centre-forward, so we were thinking of John for there. But when a player is your teams only All Star (at wing-back), you are under certain pressure to pick him in that position, so we were inclined to go with him in defence.
John is a player that needs match after match, he was injured for a few weeks leading up to the Munster championship and he did not stand out in the game against Clare. We had David (Kennedy) coming in the last 15 minutes against Clare nailing down his position, and Paul Kelly playing well, likewise Eamon Corcoran. For the Munster final, Paul Kelly went to midfield for the injured Conor Gleeson, which meant that John remained at wing-back against Limerick, where - still not fit enough - he was under pressure and replaced.
This then gave us the opportunity and we decided to start John at centre-forward against Wexford. I think everyone in Tipp knew that he was going to start at centre forward even though he was named number five. I was watching him going to his position and noticed that Liam Dunne thought he was at the wrong side of the field when he saw John Carroll appearing, he wasn't ready for John Carroll.
I thought he was a huge player for us. To be honest, if you were picking an Irish team tomorrow you’d have to go for Ken McGrath or John Carroll at centre-forward. Well, I would anyway.
Premierview :
Carroll's move to centre-forward seemed to give Eddie Enright a new lease of life at midfield?
Nicky :
I think that has been forgotten in the euphoria over John Carroll moving to centre-forward. People forget that Eddie Enright became an All Star midfielder out of the opposite side of that move. Eddie has been a super player for us over the last two years, even in the quarter-final defeat to Galway last year, and last year’s Munster final he was one of our better players. He is basically a midfielder that plays centre-forward, rather than a centre-forward that plays midfield. For us he was a tremendous addition to Tommy in midfield.
Premierview :
Declan Ryan is viewed in Tipperary as an exceptional player. How do you feel about the prospect of having to replace him?
Nicky :
Declan is always going to be impossible to replace. The task for the person who has to come in to replace him is huge because they are always going to be compared to Declan Ryan.
You saw the way he controlled the ball with his foot in the county semi-final, when the ball was going away from him! How many players could do that?
How do you replace him ? He's irreplaceable to me, to be honest with you. It is going to be difficult but is an opportunity for other players. Ultimately, I believe from Declan's personal point of view, that he made the correct decision as he has played superbly and successfully for a long time, and he owes Tipperary nothing in my view.
Premierview :
Can you see many new faces on the panel for this year?
Nicky :
We will have a few challenge games in before the League starts and two or three lads will join the panel. There were some outstanding performances in the county championship, but newcomers have to come into a team and panel that is already well established. I am conscious too that in the years after we won All-Irelands, there was often too many changes made. We have a panel of about twenty eight players and the more guys you have challenging for positions the better we like it, but we won't make changes for the sake of making changes. Through injuries etc. you have to, but we have always worked with the policy that if you get on the team and do well, you stay there.
Premierview :
When you finish with Tipperary can you see yourself doing like Babs Keating and maybe managing another county?
Nicky :
I don't think so, I don't have ambitions with anyone else. All my ambitions have been involved with Tipperary. I found I missed it when I retired as a player. I know for sure when I leave Tipp this time that will be it for me.
Premierview :
Could you see yourself in a media role like Ger Loughnane or Michael Duignan?
Nicky :
I don't know. I wouldn’t rule it out but I wouldn’t be too anxious for it either. I think at this stage I have nearly earned the right just to go to the matches just to enjoy them !
Premierview :
Any chance that you would do a Sean Boylan and remain as manager for twenty years ?!
Nicky :
I don’t think it would be feasible. You come to Dublin today and see the traffic, I leave Dublin at 4pm for training and leave Thurles at 10pm to get back to Dublin that night, it’s not easy. I would love to do it for the rest of my life, but (a) it’s very demanding physically, and (b) I would not be good enough. There’s a finite amount of time anybody could do that job and do it correctly.
Without looking too far down the road, this coming year will be a bigger test of us as any other year. We have to start at the bottom again, last year’s All- Ireland is over, that moment is gone. We have South Africa, the All-Stars tour, etc.. All that softens people. It softens management, it softens players. It also softens supporters. Maybe you won't see that intensity from our supporters as we had last year. Our job is to combat that effect as much as we can and focus in on the year ahead. We have our first dose of reality on May 19th, and a heavy dose it will be. If we are not physically and mentally ready we have no business going to Pairc Ui Chaoimh.
Roll on 2002 and we just might turn up !!!
Last December, Premierview, Mulcair, and Ed Donnelly of the official Tipperary GAA website enjoyed an experience which had many a defender tearing his hair out over the years - an hour and a bit in the company of Nicky English ! Nicky proved to be sparkling company and would talk hurling all day long, which suited us just fine! As they say in Tipp "the sliothars were flying" for about an hour and a half, and the interview you are about to read is the result of our conversation.
We would like to thank Nicky for his approachability and courtesy at all times. It is said that you should never meet your hero, as you'll inevitably be disappointed; but we can say that this old adage certainly didn't hold true in this case. It was obvious during our conversation that while Nicky has been a successful player and manager with Tipp, he remains first and foremost a Tipperary supporter.
By adding a managerial All-Ireland title to his many playing achievements, Nicky further copper-fastened his already assured place in the pantheon of Tipperary hurling greats. No doubt his views will be of great interest to all Tipperary people. We hope you enjoy reading the interview, as much as we enjoyed compiling it.
Premierview :
Did you enjoy the whole All-Ireland experience, the build-up, the actual game?
Nicky :
In the run up to the game, Anne and I were moving house so we had a lot on our plate, which took away to some degree from the constant thinking about the match. At the Wednesday night training session before the final, there was a massive crowd there, and I was concerned that the whole thing could go way over the top like I thought it did in 1988. I was very conscious of avoiding that. On the day of the match everyone was very relaxed, as relaxed as we possibly could have been. I felt quite confident that if we got into a close game that we would win.
I thought that when Mark O'Leary got his goal in the second half that we would have to win, as we were getting every break that was going. The only time I felt a bit dodgy was when Galway got the goal. I though that this was a dangerous time, but still we were getting points consistently, every time they scored we got the next one, so it relaxed us again. When the timekeeper put four minutes up, it was a very nerve-wracking experience as well. Other than those moments, I was comfortable enough all throughout, but to be honest hearing the final whistle was a major relief.
Premierview :
You mentioned in the TV interview after the final whistle that you were "out of a hole". Did you feel that degree of pressure?
Nicky :
I knew the first day when I took the job I was going in to a hole. That's the nature of being a manager of any inter-county team, the Tipp job particularly. I was taking a chance. I suppose I had a certain reputation as a player and I was throwing that aside and going down to start at the bottom again. When I was approached about the job, I discussed it with people, and some even advised me against taking the job. But it was a job I just couldn't turn my back on no matter how hard I tried. When the final whistle went after the All-Ireland Final, which was the culmination of our efforts, I felt relief more than anything else. That was the main emotion.
Premierview :
Would it have been hard for the team to come back next year if we had lost the All-Ireland Final?
Nicky :
I think the Munster final would have been a more dangerous one to lose in that regard. I think you always need to have progression and development within a team. I was more anxious about the Munster Final. If we had lost, that would have stalled our “progress”. We knew how hard it was going to be coming through the back door. We knew that from the previous year. If we had lost the quarter-final, then we had regressed. But once we won the Munster final there was progression anyway, whatever happened after that.
Also we were so well prepared this year, that it would have thrown us a lot if we had lost the Munster Final. Last year we could clearly identify what went wrong between the Munster Final and the All-Ireland Quarter-Final, but in 2001 unless bad luck or a better team was going to beat us, we knew we weren't going to lose because we played badly.
I was pretty confident that we would play to the same consistent standard in every match. This was reassuring coming up to the All-Ireland Final as well. Galway had played only one really competitive match. I thought on the day that Galway played great against Kilkenny, but when I watched the video afterwards I had no doubt that Tipp could beat them. I was fairly sure of what way Tipp were going to play, but you couldn't be as sure what way Galway were going to play as they had only played one major match.
Premierview :
You retired as a player in 1996, and became manager just two years later. Did you find the fact that you were a player so recently an advantage or a disadvantage when you became manager?
Nicky :
It was both an advantage and a disadvantage to be honest. It was a disadvantage in the sense that I had to deal with players I had played with, which is awkward enough. Particularly so at the stage that some of them were at, as they were getting to the latter days. I suppose the advantage was recently experiencing what players appreciate and want from management, so there were two sides of it to be honest. I think for me in the decision-making process as to whether to take the job, the former (the disadvantage) was playing on my mind a good bit. I thought that maybe if you gave it more of a gap then you wouldn't have to deal with former colleagues. Someone else would have to do that job, and that it would have been easier for me, but that's all history now.
Premierview :
Would you consider that your eventual successor would benefit from working with the outgoing management team, like they have done in Cork with the likes of Tom Cashman and Bertie Og Murphy, or is a fresh face and a fresh approach a better option?
Nicky :
I don't have a view on that. I think if the day comes that you identify a successor, you should just go anyway. I'd have to say as a player myself, a fresh voice is very important. There needs to be a fresh voice or a fresh approach all the time, Otherwise it just becomes routine or mundane, and it's just not going to work. The more variety there is the better.
Personally I believe that there's plenty of people that can manage the Tipperary team. Obviously from a personal view it would have been better for me to go after the All-Ireland final. However,I don't view the job in a selfish way. I'm just there to do a bit, when I think my bit is done and I can go no further, I will leave it up to other people to get the successor. It's not a manager's job to pick a successor; it's the county board's job. If a manager gets that powerful he should be turfed out anyway.
Premierview :
What do you think is the ideal agreed term for a county team manager at the outset, a term that doesn't put undue pressure on either the management or county board ? Would you favour a three year arrangement as seems to happen in many counties, or perhaps the Offaly model where they do it on a year-to-year basis, so no matter what happens everyone knows where they stand?
Nicky :
We had three years at the beginning, and now it's effectively year to year. Generally, I suppose the same thing won't suit everybody. A lot depends on whether there's a perceived progression in the team. I don't think we as a management team did come under pressure in the first two years. Maybe it helped that we were on a three-year term, that people did not panic, and say that we need do something here because they haven't won the All Ireland.
It's unrealistic to expect that in current competitive hurling that you are going to win an All Ireland every three years. We in Tipp have to wise up to that fact; if we don't we're not going to compete at the level we can. We have to be realistic about things. We start at the bottom every year, and we need our team firing on all cylinders. We must be competitive, and at worst be hard to beat, then in the years that we deserve a break we should get them, and that's what happened in 2001.
Premierview :
Do you feel there's undue pressure in Tipp with regard to expectation?
Nicky :
I think it has improved a lot. But I see it as equally important in the context of the Tipperary team itself, to have our fans as prepared as our team. The days when our supporters go to games expecting to win, are traditionally the days when Tipp are most vulnerable. I can go back to my time, 1990 Munster final, 1996 Munster final. On Munster final day 2000, our fans were not prepared for battle.
I think the atmosphere that day got through to the players. Nobody was prepared for the match, the supporters thought there was going to be a concert and this seeped through to the team. This year the supporters were feeling the pressure more. We did not have great vocal support for the Limerick game this year, but it's not that we had a low turn-out of supporters; its just that the supporters weren't there with fire in their bellies as they were filled with anxiety and a fear of losing. They couldn't open their mouths. Limerick supporters and team had nothing to lose, they were on a roll, and that made it even more difficult for Tipp to win. If you take the second game against Wexford, I'm sure we had a much smaller crowd than the first day, but the Tipp vocal support at the replay was coming out over the stand. It makes a huge difference to the team, I know what it's like for a player. I played in '96 against Limerick in the Gaelic Grounds when you would have had the same number of supporters from both counties, but the Tipp support in the second half was dead when Limerick started coming at us.
Is there too much expectation in Tipperary? I don't think so anymore, I hope not either, but the support is important to players.
Premierview :
Nicky, you played under many good managers as a player, people like Babs Keating, Fr Michael O'Brien, who would you say has had most influence on your own style of management?
Nicky :
I think you just take the best from everybody, we're all basically imitators. I took the best from everybody and tried to develop my own style. I think Babs in the Tipperary context brought a lot to it, he was prepared to go outside the norm, rather to just do it the way all others had done it before. He was prepared to get a supporters club, have blazers, make things stand out. In the Tipperary context I brought more from him than any other manager I have seen.
Premierview :
How important was it for you as a player having played during the bad times '82-'86 to be in a successful Tipperary team in the late '80s?
Nicky :
The bad times were not as bad as they are maybe portrayed. There were many close games; years where we were as good as anybody if we got the same breaks. It wasn't like we were miles off the pace.
I think that Babs changed things, the approach; so you felt that there was more value and glamour in playing for Tipperary at that stage. At the same time it took nearly three years to win the All Ireland, even though a lot of us had fair grounding before that.
If you look back, we played a Munster final in 1984 with the same kind of hype as they had last year. In 1985 we did the same and didn't do it. In '87 when we got to Croke Park, 90% of the team didn't play. We came back in '88 in an All Ireland Final we didn't play at all. They often say you have to lose one before you win one, but losing can make it more difficult to come back too. I think it was Jimmy Barry Murphy that said it's as easy to win your first All-Ireland as your last. By losing those matches maybe we made it harder for ourselves to win it a few years later.
Premierview :
Is the role or importance of the manager sometimes over-stated?
Nicky :
My view is that a good manager doesn't make a huge amount of difference, but a bad one will kill off a team's drive, and ultimately their chances. Obviously the manager needs to be smart but the team needs to develop itself as well. Our fellows learnt more in the last two years through defeat than anything else. Only if they are smart enough to realise that they did make mistakes, and try to do something about them, are they in a position to win. If you take our team last year, they hadn't played in a Munster final or they hadn't played in Croke Park. Last year they did both, and both were bad experiences for them. By this year, they had learnt from the things they had done wrong. There were things we needed to change. Ultimately, players have to have to capacity to learn and improve. The manager's role is largely to influence that development, and make sure the team is picking up the correct principles. There's only so much a manager can do.
Premierview :
You made some good additions to the panel this year, Premierview was behind you in the dug-out this year when you played Waterford in the League in Nenagh and could not help noticing your appreciation of Lar Corbett. Was this the player you were looking for in the League?
Nicky :
There were very few players who could do what he did that day. I think hurling is a very simple game; the better your first touch, the better player you're going to be. All the great players I have ever seen had a great first touch and he has that, and he did show it that day.
He was the kind of player we were looking for. Our last game before the present season was the All-Ireland Quarter-Final against Galway, and the one thing I took from that was that we needed to change our approach up front. I felt that we were still very individual and that we also lacked leadership in that game. Certainly one other major thing we lacked was pace. To me there's no substitute for pace, that first couple of yards can be the difference. The first day we saw Lar Corbett was in the South-East League against Clare, and I thought he has the one thing we are looking for and that is pace, he had the all the raw ingredients, but the main thing is he had pace. 2002 will be a tough year for him but if he develops physically and continues to improve he will be a serious threat to opposing teams.
Premierview :
Hurling in the last ten years has become a lot more demanding in fitness terms. Would you like to be starting your career in modern hurling and all the fitness requirements that goes with it?
Nicky :
I'd love to be able to start again! Every sport is always going to evolve and get better. The 100 metres record is never going to get slower. Sport gets better, people get bigger and stronger and they certainly get faster. If it involves more training then that's the way it is.
It's the same in any walk of life or in business. If you were to adhere to health and safety regulations, or work practices that were twenty years old, your business would probably be closed down! It doesn't mean they weren't very good at the time, but thing always keep evolving. The bar keeps being raised. That's the nature of things.
I think if you are ambitious to play hurling, you'll just have to come to the standard of the day.
Premierview :
There’s always debate comparing teams and players of different eras. How would the likes of John Doyle survive in the modern game in your opinion?
Nicky :
I have no doubt he would survive very easily. I think John Doyle would be a magnificent player today, because he had the desire to be that in his day, and still would today.
It's difficult to compare different eras anyway. For example, take the '87 Munster final replay in Killarney, it is meant to be one of the best games we played. But if you watch that game on video it does not seem that good. To me it looks slow and scrappy compared to what we see today. I think if you look back at a match on video outside the context of the time, you will often see a different game to what you thought it was. However, the great players or athletes of any era would still be great in other times as they would have the desire, and therefore would come to the required standard of the day and beyond.
Premierview :
The Tipperary team you played in under Babs is often accused of under-achieving. Do you think that's a fair comment, or is it just the product of ridiculous expectation levels again?
Nicky :
Maybe it's a little bit to do with expectation levels. There might be a case we could have won it in '88 or we could have won it in '90, depending on different circumstances. It's difficult to say what is a reasonable level of achievement, because in a team’s development the older they get the more things they have on their plates themselves. Sometimes people don't realise that when they point to the average age of a team and say a team is not "old". By 1991 a lot of us were pushing on into the late twenties, a lot of fellows were married, or more involved in business. Lots of different factors make it more difficult as player’s circumstances change. I suppose 1990 would be the one that stood out for me as the one we should have won. We walked in with our mouths open, we went in as red-hot favourites. Couldn't be beaten. Cork were useless etc. and bang, we were hit by a train. Nobody was prepared for it.
Premierview :
Would there be a feeling the 1990 team was poorly selected, John Leahy at full forward and Pat Fox being substituted?
Nicky :
To be honest, I couldn't believe the team that was picked that day. Having said that, there were a lot of the players after '89 that weren't playing as well as they should have been either. I don't necessarily think that the Babs should shoulder all of the blame. We as players couldn't say we played well on the day.
I think its too simplistic to blame Babs, while he seems to get the blame. Yet he left himself open for it with several decisions that were made. At the same time the players had to shoulder it as well, because the same hunger was not there in '90 as there was in '89; not even close. The team that played in July '90, had been on the road in '87,'88, and '89. Why did Kilkenny lose this year? You could not say it was bad selection choices, I think it boiled down to hunger.
You can look back at various years and say we should have won more, then on the other hand you could say we were very lucky to win '91. The chances are if we had won in '90, you wouldn't even get us out of the train the following year! I think two All Irelands is a fair achievement for any team.
Premierview :
Following on from that mention of Babs in 1990, a lot is made of management teams and their decisions, but you mentioned a few times this year that it is about what happens "between the white lines". Do you think people should realise that ultimately that is where it happens?
Nicky :
I believe so anyway. On match day there is very little you can do, even though the public will give you massive credit for moves if your team wins, and castigate you for maybe the same changes if your team loses. In my view, ultimately the game is about players and all the big decisions are made inside the white lines.
Premierview :
In your book "Beyond the Tunnel", you mentioned that winning the '87 Munster final was the highlight of your career, would this years All-Ireland win match it or even surpass it?
Nicky :
I think as a player, the 1987 Munster final was the highlight, the most exciting. But in terms of sheer relief nothing would compare with the final whistle this year, just purely in terms of relief, not just achievement. I couldn't believe when the final whistle went. I don't consider myself the luckiest person in the world in many respects, but we had every bit of luck that was going then. For the feeling of achievement it would be hard to beat 1987, but for the significance of a single moment, the final whistle in the 2001 match is unsurpassed.
Premierview :
You played your club hurling with Lattin-Cullen, a Junior/Intermediate
club all your career. Do you ever wish you had the chance to play with a
more successful club in Tipperary and play for the Dan Breen Cup?
Nicky :
Not really, no. Our ambitions were certainly never about that, or my personal ambitions were never about that. I never expected that we could be in a position to do that. We did have amalgamation teams in our time. We joined with Golden and Annacarty, and we had as good as chance of winning the Dan Breen cup as any club in the West. We had a super team, but could not get past the first round. We did not have the same team ethic as successful club teams.
I have strong views on whether you should change clubs. There were a number of times I could have considered it, in Cork particularly. But in my view, changing clubs can most times get people into a bit of hassle. Ultimately no matter how badly you play with your own club, they know you, they know your family, they know reasons why you might have played badly, or the reasons why you couldn't play well on a particular day. They accept that, and they will back you regardless.
If you go to another club there is rarely the same loyalty factor. They're probably wondering why you changed clubs in the first place. You're only there really to play well; you're not there to be a born and bred club member. That's the way I viewed it anyway. I don't have any regrets, because at the end of the day I wouldn't have really considered it.
Premierview :
Do you think it would be of benefit to the county to have " permanent" amalgamations in predominantly Junior/Intermediate hurling areas of Tipperary, such as they have in Cork ? A system which would give good players who come from smaller clubs, the ability to aspire to playing regularly at the highest level of club hurling.
Nicky :
The more competitive you can make club hurling in Tipperary - whatever way you do it - the better it would be for the county team. The less the gap between club and county the better. Whatever way you achieve that, I would be in favour of it.
I think we must reduce the amount of senior clubs, and make everybody competitive at the next level. The relegation policy of the county board will help I think, as it will reduce the number of senior clubs. The less senior clubs in Tipp the better, it means you have to reach a higher standard to be up in the top division.
We have a fairly traditional structure in that we still have divisions, which makes regulating the number of teams at each grade more difficult. The county league has tried to move it away from that.
Premierview :
With the current crop of GAA books on the market, can we expect a new version of your book "Beyond the Tunnel" updated with your managerial career? If Vincent Hogan rang you, would you consider it?
Nicky :
No, there is a major difference between writing a book as a player and writing a book as a selector or manager, I think to write a book which wouldn’t be bland - as a manager - you have to give views on individual players and I wouldn't do that. I don't think it would be fair or worth it.
Premierview :
So you are of the opinion what is said in the dressing room stays in the dressing room?
Nicky :
In general I think the media in Ireland in latter years have used a bit too much sensationalism, and because of that managers and players have pulled back a bit from it. This is a pity because it means the public gets less of an insight into what goes on, and everybody suffers. It is exciting and everybody should have an idea what goes on.
It would be good to see general information available to all supporters, but maybe some of the media have abused the privilege a bit. It needs to come back to where it was. From my point of view, in the build-up to the All-Ireland we felt that the players deserved as much attention as they were getting. If they can’t handle this little pressure they shouldn't be on the team in the first place.
Premierview :
In 1988 you assumed the captaincy from Pa O’Neill with all the controversy that surrounded it, the main reason being the unwritten rule that the county champions pick the captain. Would you be in favour of retaining that “rule”, or would you like to see selectors picking the captain as in some other counties?
Nicky :
I think we have to get away from that rule as it has caused a lot of trouble. Ultimately it has impacted on our chances, either through players being on the team as they had to be captain or otherwise.
It has to be changed, the way to possibly do it is to put a time-frame on it, like saying we will change it three years time, and then nobody has a problem,as who knows who will be county champions then and things shouldn’t get parochial.
Saying that, Tommy Dunne is the probably as good a captain we have ever had, Tommy would be captain whether Toomevara won the county championship or not. It’s just pure luck that he is captain because Toomevara are county champions.
Premierview :
Declan Carr made a comeback in '99, successfully playing in the League Final victory. Despite this, he didn't feature against Clare in the championship. This was quite a talking point at the time. What was the thinking behind not playing him in the game against Clare?
Nicky :
In hindsight, it probably was a mistake to be honest. I think the biggest mistake was that he was not put on as sub the first day against Clare. The biggest regret about that game against Clare in '99 was that we did not use our subs wisely. Now we make substitutions as a matter of course. By minute 60 or 61 or whatever, we're bringing on a fresh player almost no matter how the team is playing. I think in that first game against Clare - had we used him - Declan would have brought us home. The original thinking was we were going to go at a million miles an hour, which we did.
Premierview :
Was this why Brendan Cummins kept pucking the ball out immediately?
Nicky:
Yes, we wanted to play like that, bang bang bang.
Premierview :
Did you feel that confident about the fitness of the team?
Nicky :
Oh yeah, plus we knew nobody had done that before. Clare couldn't have been ready for that the first day. We had a young fit team. There was a worry with the two Declans - could we go that pace with both of them? It was part of the game-plan more than anything else. We had the same game-plan for the replay - to play at a million miles an hour again for 15, 20 minutes and then bring in Declan Ryan to guide the ship home. But by the time we brought him in, the game was already lost. We learnt a lot of lessons that day, hard lessons.
Premierview :
In the interview immediately after the All-Ireland Final you spoke about "going away from the style" on previous occasions during your managerial tenure. Does it give you great satisfaction to have won an All Ireland putting your own stamp on the team's style of play?
Nicky :
When we came in to manage the Tipp team we looked at what was being successful around at that time, which is all you can do. What was being successful at the time we came in was very fit teams such as Clare. We had been out of it for a few years, so it crossed our minds that things may have changed. We had not won one since '91, when we won in '89 and '91 we had started new types of training and were fitter than most teams around at that time. I think Tipp and Galway at the time brought it on a lot.
That initial impression we had in '99 was probably wrong. Clare weren't winning just because they were the fittest team, they were winning because they were the best team. They had the best full-back, the best centre-back, two of the best midfielders around, and one of the best forwards probably of all-time. We had the impression that in '98 the team was maybe not fit enough and in '99 we decided that whatever happened we wouldn't be beaten by fitness. Later on with the type of team we had we felt we needed to adopt a new style. This year we didn't lack for fitness either, as our starting point was that the team would be fit anyway.
I think our hurling was better this year. In training we did concentrate more on first touch and hurling, but our team now was better able to take chances. They had been there before and rushed shots. Now the emphasis was being able to pick a player in a better position and make good decisions on the ball rather than shooting on sight and taking Hail Mary pots at goal. There were a number of instances of bad decision-making in the Munster final of 2000 for example, when I think we had twelve wides in the first half. That day because players had missed so many scoreable chances earlier, they were afraid to go for some easy chances later. But it was as much the team naturally developing, and individual players getting more comfortable with their roles within the team, as any training ground moves.
Premierview :
The movement of John Carroll to centre forward is seen by many people as potentially the move that took Tipp from just another contender to eventual All Ireland Champions. Do you consider that a very significant move? And was it something the selectors had it mind for a while or did it just happen spontaneously?
Nicky :
He certainly had played in the forwards for us before. At the start of the League against Derry, John played full forward, and against Wexford in Thurles, he was centre forward. We view John as being an exceptional player who could play anywhere, wherever the need is greatest.
We had been a long time blessed with Declan Ryan centre forward. We never even had to think about it; Declan was going to be centre forward and that was it. In 2001 after Declan's injury problems the previous year, it didn't look likely that Declan was going to be centre-forward, so we were thinking of John for there. But when a player is your teams only All Star (at wing-back), you are under certain pressure to pick him in that position, so we were inclined to go with him in defence.
John is a player that needs match after match, he was injured for a few weeks leading up to the Munster championship and he did not stand out in the game against Clare. We had David (Kennedy) coming in the last 15 minutes against Clare nailing down his position, and Paul Kelly playing well, likewise Eamon Corcoran. For the Munster final, Paul Kelly went to midfield for the injured Conor Gleeson, which meant that John remained at wing-back against Limerick, where - still not fit enough - he was under pressure and replaced.
This then gave us the opportunity and we decided to start John at centre-forward against Wexford. I think everyone in Tipp knew that he was going to start at centre forward even though he was named number five. I was watching him going to his position and noticed that Liam Dunne thought he was at the wrong side of the field when he saw John Carroll appearing, he wasn't ready for John Carroll.
I thought he was a huge player for us. To be honest, if you were picking an Irish team tomorrow you’d have to go for Ken McGrath or John Carroll at centre-forward. Well, I would anyway.
Premierview :
Carroll's move to centre-forward seemed to give Eddie Enright a new lease of life at midfield?
Nicky :
I think that has been forgotten in the euphoria over John Carroll moving to centre-forward. People forget that Eddie Enright became an All Star midfielder out of the opposite side of that move. Eddie has been a super player for us over the last two years, even in the quarter-final defeat to Galway last year, and last year’s Munster final he was one of our better players. He is basically a midfielder that plays centre-forward, rather than a centre-forward that plays midfield. For us he was a tremendous addition to Tommy in midfield.
Premierview :
Declan Ryan is viewed in Tipperary as an exceptional player. How do you feel about the prospect of having to replace him?
Nicky :
Declan is always going to be impossible to replace. The task for the person who has to come in to replace him is huge because they are always going to be compared to Declan Ryan.
You saw the way he controlled the ball with his foot in the county semi-final, when the ball was going away from him! How many players could do that?
How do you replace him ? He's irreplaceable to me, to be honest with you. It is going to be difficult but is an opportunity for other players. Ultimately, I believe from Declan's personal point of view, that he made the correct decision as he has played superbly and successfully for a long time, and he owes Tipperary nothing in my view.
Premierview :
Can you see many new faces on the panel for this year?
Nicky :
We will have a few challenge games in before the League starts and two or three lads will join the panel. There were some outstanding performances in the county championship, but newcomers have to come into a team and panel that is already well established. I am conscious too that in the years after we won All-Irelands, there was often too many changes made. We have a panel of about twenty eight players and the more guys you have challenging for positions the better we like it, but we won't make changes for the sake of making changes. Through injuries etc. you have to, but we have always worked with the policy that if you get on the team and do well, you stay there.
Premierview :
When you finish with Tipperary can you see yourself doing like Babs Keating and maybe managing another county?
Nicky :
I don't think so, I don't have ambitions with anyone else. All my ambitions have been involved with Tipperary. I found I missed it when I retired as a player. I know for sure when I leave Tipp this time that will be it for me.
Premierview :
Could you see yourself in a media role like Ger Loughnane or Michael Duignan?
Nicky :
I don't know. I wouldn’t rule it out but I wouldn’t be too anxious for it either. I think at this stage I have nearly earned the right just to go to the matches just to enjoy them !
Premierview :
Any chance that you would do a Sean Boylan and remain as manager for twenty years ?!
Nicky :
I don’t think it would be feasible. You come to Dublin today and see the traffic, I leave Dublin at 4pm for training and leave Thurles at 10pm to get back to Dublin that night, it’s not easy. I would love to do it for the rest of my life, but (a) it’s very demanding physically, and (b) I would not be good enough. There’s a finite amount of time anybody could do that job and do it correctly.
Without looking too far down the road, this coming year will be a bigger test of us as any other year. We have to start at the bottom again, last year’s All- Ireland is over, that moment is gone. We have South Africa, the All-Stars tour, etc.. All that softens people. It softens management, it softens players. It also softens supporters. Maybe you won't see that intensity from our supporters as we had last year. Our job is to combat that effect as much as we can and focus in on the year ahead. We have our first dose of reality on May 19th, and a heavy dose it will be. If we are not physically and mentally ready we have no business going to Pairc Ui Chaoimh.
Roll on 2002 and we just might turn up !!!
