Silverware. For Patrick Horgan it has become almost a unit of measurement. And on Leeside, the numbers just haven’t been adding up for quite some time now.
With just under five weeks remaining until the provincial hurling championships begins, most bookmakers have Limerick and Cork installed as the early front-runners in the race for Liam MacCarthy.
Right now, three trophies remain on the table for Cork – but taking them from there and placing them in a trophy cabinet has been the problem for the Rebels in recent years.
They last won the league title in 1998 while their most recent All-Ireland SHC triumph was in 2005. A Munster senior crown was last collected in 2018.
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“Down through the years we’ve put in big performances in big games but following it up to win silverware is something we haven’t really done and obviously [is] something we want to do,” says Horgan.
“People talk about us like we’re in the bracket with the top teams out there, but they all have trophies and we don’t.
“So obviously we have to get to positions they were in or they are in, they have them, we have to try and get there somehow. The fact is, we haven’t done that.”
It’s not that Cork haven’t been in the mix for silverware, it’s more that they have tended to come up just short in those showpiece matches – most recently last year’s epic All-Ireland final against Clare.
Should they beat Galway on Saturday then Cork will progress to a first league final appearance since 2022 – but the 27-year gap without a Division One triumph is the standout measurement.
“I don’t think we have put in our best performance yet,” adds Horgan. “I think we’ve a lot of room for improvement. And we know that. When we chat at training, we know there’s a lot more in the tank but we have to get it out. And that’s the aim.”
The morning after Cork’s All-Ireland final loss to Clare last July, Horgan committed to the blood and bandages' cause for 2025. It would have been easy to stew, ponder, leave it up in the air – but he wasn’t having it. He was coming back.
And having made his Cork senior debut in 2008, the 36-year-old Glen Rovers clubman doesn’t agree that the focus should be on longevity, but rather on talent, ability and commitment.
“It’s a hard one because you get reminded of your age all the time, age shouldn’t be a thing and not just because of the age I am,” he says. When you actually break it down to what you need to do to play at the level we’re playing, I think I’m able.
“You probably hear from a lot of players that have moved on [and retired], they get a feeling at some stage, ‘This is it, I can’t do this, I can’t do that, I can’t get to the ball, I don’t really have the appetite to go and do the extra before training or after’. Something might go like that, but for me nothing like that has happened yet.
“I love it. I feel like I’m competing really well, same as anyone else down training, I just want to get a position on the team.”
And he believes this is the strongest Cork squad he has ever been involved with during his intercounty career.
“Without a doubt, yeah. Even though we still have a lot to do, we haven’t really done anything yet, but we have a really strong panel, that’s one thing we do have.
“Everybody has real pressure on and you can see it even by the way the players train. There’s a lot of positions open for fellas to get in.
“Pat and the lads have obviously shown that if you’re training hard enough and you’re putting in the performance, you’ll be straight in the team.”
It has been an emotional week on Leeside with the passing of Cork stalwart Ger Fitzgerald at just 60 years of age. Fitzgerald won two All-Ireland SHC medals with the Rebels – in 1986 and 1990. He was also involved with the Cork management team when Horgan first joined the seniors.
“And he would have been around our Cork minor team as well. It’s sad, it’s very sad,” says Horgan.
“He was a really friendly fella. Everybody had loads of time for him. And when it was time to get serious, he was well able for that too. But yeah, a very nice fella and really gave us a good start there with the minors.”
Horgan was speaking at the announcement of John West’s tenth anniversary as sponsors of the GAA’s under-15 annual Féile Peile na nÓg (football) and Féile na nGael (camogie and hurling) competitions.
