Legends: George O'Connor, Part 2

The GAA Museum Legends Tour Series has returned to Croke Park for a fifth season, and this Thursday it's the turn of Wexford hurler George O'Connor to relive some of his greatest moments in the Model County jersey.

George O'Connor played for Wexford from 1979 to 1996, and won the first of two GAA All Stars two years into his career with the county, in 1981. Incredibly, his last game for Wexford was 15 years later in the 1996 All-Ireland hurling final, when he won his one and only All-Ireland medal.

George knelt down on the Croke Park turf in the moments after that victory. It's one of the most iconic images in Irish sporting history.

This is Part 2 of an exclusive interview GAA.ie conducted with George this week. Part 1, outlining his early sporting life and the years of hurt before the final triumph, went online yesterday.

This is his story. This is just part of his journey in life.

THE REVOLUTION YEARS

If Liam Griffin hadn't come along in 1994 I would have retired. I knew from speaking to Liam over the years - he was involved in a district football team in 1977 that I played on - that he was the only one that really had that little bit of X-factor.

We started training in early October 1994. Liam knew he didn't have the best hurlers in the country but he did decide that he was going to control what he could control. He could control our fitness and change the way we defended. "I'm going to make you the most difficult team to beat in the country," he said. Those were the things he could control. The fitter we got, the more focused and psychologically stronger we were able to become.

GAINING AN EDGE

He introduced a sports psychologist (Niamh Fitzpatrick). It was more a person to focus the guys and to look for a reaction from them. Instead of the coach speaking all the time, he wanted the players to speak.

At the time, I said to myself "he's really gone too far this time, he's some boll***s bringing her in here." I remember she came in to us in a pair of fancy boots. A woman. I thought, "I'm not hurling for the last 17 years to have this woman telling me how to hurl." I wasn't at all pleased in the beginning.

It was definitely exactly what we needed but I didn't realise it at the time. She was a fantastic person to break down the macho barrier built up by these guys. They were all successful guys in other aspects of their lives but they hadn't won any silverware. We didn't know what psychological focus was until we got into it. Men are not good at staying focused for long periods of time. Part of her job was to convince us we were winners.

FACING FACTS

We had Liam Griffin who had studied fitness to a savage level all over the world. We also had a thing called playing facts. The first time I saw playing facts going up on the wall I knew this was different. If a guy fouled four times in the second half of a game, he couldn't dispute that. Facts were facts. They were all logged, in black and white, and we simply couldn't argue with them.

He was way ahead of everybody else. Everything was analysed - how many fouls, how many frees, breaking balls. He had the lot. Down to each individual. We got proper feedback, rather than what you'd get from a guy who'd come into a dressing room with a hurling stick and a string of expletives. That old balderdash was gone. He was dealing with guys who were teachers, guys in the bank. Intelligent people. If you treat people intelligently, you'll get that back. If you continue bawling in dressing rooms people won't listen. The odd time Liam raised his voice, we listened. There is no place for negativity in life.

BUMPS ON THE ROAD

There were other people in the background making sure it all worked, but Liam Griffin had the steering wheel all the time. It wasn't plain sailing from the start. After the trauma of 1993 and '94, the disappointment was inherent in the guys, deep in them. It was a case of here we go again with a new manager. We needed a year to gel. There were problems. Two weeks before the Leinster Championship match against Offaly in 1995, some members of the squad wanted to play in a club match. It happened twice. Some guys went out and played matches they shouldn't have played. He asked us not to play and that was when Liam realised he was up against a lot of walls.

When the guys played that club game before the Offaly game, he came into training and he knew the trust was gone. The trust, honesty and loyalty needed for the right kind of preparation just wasn't there. He learnt a hard lesson the first year he was there. He was dealing with guys with personality. I think he realised that if he could get through to us and manage us properly he was on to something special.

THIS IS OUR YEAR

The following year there was no messing. He dropped the few guys he needed to drop. One guy said to him he'd come back in March, but Liam was starting training in October. He wanted guys who were totally committed. Once one or two guys don't buy into it, then the whole structure breaks down - the trust and honesty that you have to have within a squad breaks down. That trust had to be built. When he came in the first year, it was difficult for him to build trust in a team that was after being beaten in three league finals and then two championships.

BATTLE SCARS

I had a chronic hand injury going into the 1996 season. I had broken fingers and broken bones in my hand. It was all beginning to take its toll. I had broken a bone in the back of my hand and it was a matter of waiting for it to fix up. My hands tell the story of my career. They show you what happens when you don't catch the ball properly. In the end, I was breaking my fingers and I wasn't bothering to get them fixed. One of my fingers is facing Dublin and the other is facing London. They were damaged and it was affecting my catching.

But I got back pretty quickly. Liam asked me before the start of the 1996 season what part I wanted to play. I said I'd play anywhere. I'd be a sub. I'd be happy to contribute in any way. I was a sub for the Leinster final against Offaly. Liam rang me a few days beforehand to tell me I wasn't in the team. I had been in and out in the earlier rounds against Kilkenny and Dublin. My form wasn't good enough to play in a Leinster final. I said to Liam, "If I were you, I wouldn't pick me either. I'm not ready." We had to be realistic about it. It wasn't because I was 36. I just needed more training to get up to that level.

READY

Poor Seánie Flood got injured before the All-Ireland final against Limerick. He just couldn't make it back. Liam asked me how I was fixed and I said, "I'm ready". Nothing else. I knew I was ready. At 36 years of age you should be able to make up your mind pretty easily.

FOCUS. FOCUS. FOCUS.

I would have had a manic focus that day. The only sound that I allowed in that day was when we went out on the field. The sound of 82,000 people was deafening. There was a savage crowd from Wexford up there.

I'll never forget the colour on Hill 16. It was unbelievable. The only sound I allowed in was the sound that we had decided to allow in before the game - the march before the game, the build-up. We were in a red zone before we came out on the field. We were able to relax when we went out on the field because we had visualised relaxing before going the game. We didn't want to use up any excess energy.

MARCHING INTO HISTORY

When the march started we went to amber and then to green pretty quickly after that. It was the traffic light approach. Where Liam came up with it I don't know. People in dressing rooms can use up huge amounts of energy before they go out and play, hammering things off walls, banging tables and thumping each other's chests. What you are doing is using up energy that you need at the back end of a game. Why use important energy that we should be storing for the real important part of the game?

We had visualised what would happen if one of us was sent off. What would we do? What would happen if Limerick would break off in the march around with the Artane Boys Band? Limerick were known to break away early in the march. There was a psychological battle to be fought. Most of that battle would be fought before the ball was thrown in. We decided that if they did break off early, we'd keep marching until we could march no more and then stand up beside them. We won the middle of the road neutrals over because we just kept marching and marching and marching.

It was a statement. We had said that it could happen. Nothing was a surprise to us. We had a guy sent off. We had visualised this. We said, "This is OK, it's happened now. Let's get on with it." It just focused us more, as it would with any team that goes down to 14 men. Limerick became a little bit looser. We became tighter, marked tighter. We had the legs out the field, and in hurling one player is nothing anyway.

We believed 100 per cent in all these things Liam told us because we could see it was working. It was the honesty of his approach. We had hurt Liam the previous year and we had let him down. We knew that what he was doing was wonderful for us. He told us we hadn't won anything since 1977. It was the drop kick in the backside we needed. We had copped ourselves on.

THE PERFECT STORM

I don't remember anything from the game itself. We were trained to play for two hours or three hours, whatever it took. We could focus for long periods of time. We never looked up to see what the score was. I think Tom Dempsey won a breaking ball around the square and put it in the back of the net. I didn't actually hear any sound. There was 82,000 people there. I didn't hear a sound. We were trained to focus on the next ball.

We were so focused that even after receiving the cup, there was only elation immediately after the game. The minute that ended we went back to focus again. They brought us in under the Hogan Stand because there were so many people on the field, which was an unreal experience. I remember being in a little room under the Hogan Stand. There wasn't a sound. We all just sat down and were quiet. We were still in the zone. We went back to ourselves. I didn't care if the game had gone on for another two hours. I was going to continue to stay focused. Focus. Focus. Focus. Next ball. Next ball. Next ball. Hassle. Hassle. Hassle. That was our mantra.

'Drive' was a key word for us; 'hassle' was another. They were words we used hundreds and hundreds of times. When you think you are bolled, you learn something and put it in the ATM. When it's in the ATM it will automatically come out. You press the buttons and out it comes. Once your preparation is done, the rest falls into place. You trust yourself that you have that shot and you have worked at that shot. Trust in yourself and believe in yourself. We were trained to believe that we had enough artillery to win the game.

COMPLETION

When the final whistle went, there was no relief. That didn't come into it. It was like your whole life's ambition was in one flash. The dream that you had and the journey that you started from many years ago was complete. It's a bit like crossing the Sahara Desert with no water. You got across the desert and made it to the other side.

I thought about the people who had backed me all my life, from when you were a little chap at seven years of age going to your first All-Ireland on a train. That was the only time there was colour in the paper, when the two teams were on the back of the Sunday Press. The dream I had was realised, but I was very calm. Extremely calm.

You go back to your roots and your values that you were brought up with. One of the major values that I was brought up with was my faith. The church played a huge part in many people's lives back then. The GAA was part of your local community but so was the church. That's the way it was.

It was like the experience Arnie Schwarzenegger had in that film Total Recall. The strongest recollection was of my mother and father. My mother is a great believer. She's still alive. She's 92. She believes nothing is an issue and there's nothing we can't get over. She was so positive. She created a positive world and the belief in me to always keep going.

There's an emotional, a physical and a mental part of a person. There are other aspects of a person as well. They all must be addressed in order for a person to be complete. Without that there's an aspect of your life that's missing. It keeps you strong in the face of obstacles that are put in front of you. I went home and had to look in the mirror. I thought I might be able to get through my life without this happening. But I couldn't.

ABSOLUTE FAITH

When you go in to play a game against Kilkenny or Limerick you have to be right in all aspects of your life because there is an element of danger there. You have guys hitting you at ferocious speed and pace. You better have everything right. There are so many parts that need to be right. None are more important than the other. There is always a time when you are going to be tested mentally. Have you got the strength, the inner strength, to stay going as well as the physical strength to stay going?

Brian Cody speaks about the spirit of Kilkenny. People listen to what he is saying but they don't take it on board because they don't really understand what he is saying. He'll say. "The spirit was good today." He mentions it all the time, in several different ways. People can't piece together what he is trying to say. It's so much bigger than the word 'spirit'. He is speaking about the whole. About the whole team, the systems, about the way everybody gels together. That's why I think he has been so successful over the years.

If negative energies get into a team's aura it will sweep through them like locusts. If you bring negative energy into the dressing room everybody will pick it up. That's the way it is.

ICON

That photo is the physical image. Take from it what you want. It's a bit like an abstract painting. People see it in a different light. Pick up from it whatever you want to pick up from it. People say, "He was down saying a prayer, he must be religious." Others said I was saying thanks for all the years I had played and I didn't get anything from it. There are so many things you can conjure from that image.

The photographer had about two seconds to take the photo because there were people charging out onto the field. The game was over and I stood for a second. What do you do? I don't know. I remember Larry O'Gorman jumping on the wire on Hill 16. Everyone does their own thing.

I just automatically dropped down on my knees. I've seen other guys dropping to their knees and they've never been captured on film. That picture really does paint a thousand words.

GOING TO THE NEXT LEVEL

All the parts I've already talked about were right before the game. But spiritually I had to be right. What is a player prepared to do to win a game? This was the first and the last chance I was going to get to play in an All-Ireland final. I asked myself what would happen if I put my head in the wrong place and something tragic happened. I got ready spiritually for whatever happens after life. I had gone to confession and I went to communion. For the laugh, I said, "By Jesus, I'll go into the chemist and get a wormer and clean myself out as well."

I said to myself, "God help the poor divil that has to mark me because he doesn't know that I am prepared to do anything to win this match." There were all sorts of thoughts going through my head. Where would I like to die? "Jesus, Croke Park would be some place to end it all." Never in a nursing home, where someone might pull a plug out of poor old George's head, with dribble coming out of my mouth. I didn't want that. These crazy things were all flashing in my head. This was my one and only chance. This was the first, the only, the last.

WHAT A JOURNEY

This is the first time I've spoken about all this in 10 years. People will ask me the odd question about it and you give them a trivial answer and move on. I've got this privilege. It's not because I am a "legend". It's nothing like that. I want to try and contribute as much as I can for the people in life who will never get the opportunity.

Everyone has incredible experiences in their own life, whether it be their first born or whatever. Playing your first match. Getting your first medal. Your first girlfriend. Your first boyfriend. Your first partner. Whatever. You learn from experience. You might kiss her differently the second time.

That's what you call life experiences. People ask me would I not write a book. I say, "No I won't write a book." But I knew some day that someone would come to me like this and I'd tell it as it is.

The journey continues.

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George O'Connor's Legends Tours is on Thursday, 26th July at 7pm at Croke Park. All tours include a trip to the recently-refurbished GAA Museum, which is home to many exclusive exhibits, including the Sam Maguire and Liam MacCarthy Cups, as well as the new temporary exhibition 'GAA - A Global Phenomenon', which is now open running until Spring 2013. Booking for the 2012 Legends Tour Series is essential as places are limited. Click here for more information .

Other Legend Tours which will follow in the 2012 series include Liam Hayes, Jamesie O'Connor, Diarmuid O'Sullivan and Martin McHugh.