By John Harrington

By its traditionally very high standards, Cork hurling has underachieved so far this century.

The Rebels have won no senior All-Ireland senior title since 2005, no All-Ireland minor title since 2001, and no All-Ireland U-21 title since 1998.

One of the giants of the game no doubt, but a slumbering one going by those stark statistics.

Here’s a prediction – they’ve woken and are about to flex their muscles in a very serious way in the coming years.

Cork’s Games Manager Kevin O’Callaghan and his GDA’s have done huge work behind the scenes to totally overhaul the county’s underage coaching structures and are now starting to see the benefits of their labour.

The numbers don’t lie, Cork hurling is on the brink of a serious boom.

Eight years ago, there were just 60 Cúl Camps catering for 6,000 children. This summer over 17,000 children will attend 118 Cúl Camps.

Eight years ago, 12 clubs had coaching officers, now 79 clubs have active coaching officers linking in with GDA’s to develop coaches and players.

Eight years ago, 60 schools received a coaching programme of some level, now 265 schools receive club school link coaching.

A record number of 44 foundation coaching courses took place in Cork since the start of the year as well as seven Award 1 coaches.

A bench-marking scheme called ‘2020 vision’ is now in place awarding clubs with bronze, silver, and gold status depending on what criteria they meet.

18 clubs have attained gold in 2018, and the number will continue to grow steadily as clubs grow their structures.

Rebel Óg Coaching also provide the games programme in the county from under 11 down to under 6, catering for approximately 8,000 children in an age appropriate Go Games programme.

The inter-county development squad structures at underage level have been totally overhauled, most notably by breaking the county down into four regions at U-14 level thereby ensuring 120 players benefit from the best possible coaching in that age-group.

Cork badly needed to make up ground lost on rival counties who had been more proactive in terms of coaching and development, but Kevin O’Callaghan is confident they have done so.

“Cork were probably slow off the mark in embracing development squads and we paid the price for that for a couple of years,” admitted O’Callaghan.

“We would have noticed counties that have a smaller playing base than Cork getting an advantage on us in challenge games and underage tournaments.

“We’re now starting to catch up and you can see the generation of players who have come through the development squads such as Darragh Fitzgibbon, Luke Meade, Mark Coleman, Michael Cahalane who are now senior inter-county hurlers. That’s very encouraging.

“It gives that next generation of players coming behind them the inspiration to keep working hard and to recreate the achievements of the players who have gone before them.

“That lifts all players, and they’ll have something to aspire to. It reinforces brand Cork as something to work towards. They’re lucky enough to be born in a county where they’ll have a fair chance they’ll have a very competitive team every year at national level.

“The tide is turning now. It’s gone from negative to now where everyone is rowing in behind Cork again and looking to be involved in it.

“At development squad level, before you might have been struggling to get mentors involved in the squads as the perception would be that they’re disorganised or the results weren’t there or that the club players were poor.

“Now, those issues are much less frequent. We have a good supply of high profile and good quality coaches willing to come in and help drive Cork forward.”

Signs of progress are everywhere. Cork won the inaugural All-Ireland U-17 Championship last year while their minors were Munster champions and narrowly beaten in the All-Ireland FInal.

And having not been mapped for a number of years, Cork schools are competitive once more in the elite competitions like the Harty Cup which is as reliable an indicator as you’ll get for the health of the game in a county.

“Yeah, there is major work going on in the schools and there’s credit due there to the principals and teachers in our schools who are driving GAA internally,” said O’Callaghan.

“A number of schools have really stepped up to the plate to drive it forward. The like of Christians, Hamilton, Rochestown, obviously St. Colman’s have put massive effort in, Midleton CBS I suppose have never gone away, and they’ve always been prominent.

“Cork GAA owes a lot to the teachers who are putting in a lot of hard work to develop their players when they are coming in at age 13 right up to senior.”

The three big Cork City clubs – Glen Rovers, St. Finbarr’s, and Blackrock - have traditionally been the engine that has driven Cork hurling forward.

So, when their power waned  around the turn of the century, it was perhaps no surprise that Cork started slowing down too.

It looks now though as if hurling in Cork City has got a renewed vigour that bodes well for the future.

“You go around Cork city now, and you see children with the hurleys in their hands, whereas before it might have been Cork City jerseys and soccer balls,” said O’Callaghan.

“Boys are living with the hurley again, and that can only help improve playing standards.

“The likes of Glen Rovers, they’re driving on, and Douglas have become very strong.

“St Finbarrs have seen an underage resurgence in the last 2-3 years, they performed well at Féile last week and have great club-school programmes in place with massive numbers.

“There’s a lot of work going on in the city to try and improve standards. It all bodes well for the future because if you don’t have the city going well, Cork hurling typically struggles.”

Progress has been made, there are positive signs everywhere you look, and there’s a serious will from O’Callaghan and others in Cork GAA to keep progressing.

Perhaps Cork were once guilty of believing the old adage that hurlers would simply keep appearing overnight in the county like mushrooms, and that their tradition alone would be enough to keep their county teams at the cutting edge.

They’ve learned from their mistake and are determined to never be left behind by their rivals again.

“I think there’s going to be a lot of good days ahead for Cork, but we need to keep our eye on the long-term picture ” said O’Callaghan.

“While it’s good to be winning minors, ultimately Cork winning at senior level is what we want to be defined by.  There is no magic wand here, hard work is the only way this can be achieved.

“I can certainly see that Cork will be right up there. We have a good supply of players coming through the system at the moment that will certainly keep us at the top table of hurling over the next decades provided they are developed in an appropriate way”.