During his playing days, Ben O’Connor valued the counsel of Ronan Curran in the dressing-room and so it’s hardly a surprise that the St Finbarr’s man has been a valued consigliere in his coaching career.
When O’Connor was Cork U20 hurling manager in 2023 and 2024, Curran was among his selectors, with players impressed with the former centre-back’s feedback and video analysis, among other qualities.
Now, it seems that the three-time All-Star centre-back – who has managed his home club and Kanturk, as well as serving as Ballincollig coach this year – will be part of O’Connor’s management team when it is confirmed next Tuesday night.
Ballincollig coach Ronan Curran. Picture: David Creedon
In the book Cork Hurling: Game of My Life, O’Connor outlined how he ensured Curran was close at hand.
“In every dressing room I went into, I had my spot and I always had to be within two or three seats of that,” he said.
Alongside me, I’d have Ronan Curran on one side of me and Brian Murphy on the other.
“That’s the way it was, we’d always sit together and most fellas were the same. They’d have a place they’d go that they were used to.
“We used to talk away. You’d see some fellas inside there with their earphones on and Curran would be like that after a while, he’d listen to a bit of music, but there was always a bit of craic going on. The way we hurled, if fellas were relaxed they’d hurl away mad, but if you were uptight, you couldn’t. We had no fellas that were not talkers, really.”
WHERE IS ALL BEGAN: Ben O’Connor in league action against Down in 1999, his breakthrough season. Picture: Denis Minihane.
It is believed that Terence McCarthy (Midleton) and O’Connor’s fellow Newtownshandrum man William Biggane will also be in the management, as they were for the U20s, with Biggane having succeeded Anthony Nash at the end of 2023.
The one new addition would appear to be Niall O’Halloran. The Ballinhassig native has built quite a portfolio, winning county titles with Bandon, Éire Óg, Fr O’Neills and Lisgoold as well as serving as Cork minor coach under John Considine and also being involved with MTU Cork in recent years.
In that book, O’Connor chose the 2008 All-Ireland SHC win over Galway as the match he remembered with most fondness.
An episode near the end summed up the band-of-brothers nature of that team and one imagines that the new management will look to instil a similar solidarity.
“I remember with about two minutes to go, we were defending, up a point or two, and a ball broke into our corner-back position,” he said.
“I was back there and I went to go for it. I made a burst for it and I got a cramp – and very few times did I cramp up during a match.
“I still tried to go for it and, next thing, this fella shot by me and said, “I’ll get there, I’ll get there,” – it was Curran. He saw that I was after getting the cramp and he got there.”