Tipp boss Liam Cahill hits back at ' lazy and ill-informed' criticism

Irish Daily Mirror

4 days ago

It was Liam Cahill's darkest winter.
If November was bad, December was worse as he reflected on a summer when Tipp had been mauled by Limerick and Cork, earning a little bit of respect against Clare and a point against Waterford.
Now, seven months later, he is in an All-Ireland final.
And yet despite the redemption story, if you pick the scabs of the sores from 2024, the pain quickly comes to the surface.
Cahill said: 'When you're in any job, it's the same for any person in a management role, when they represent so many people, you can't help feel that responsibility.
'So, I was always looking out at a team hoping that they'll reflect what you encourage them to do and what you would like to see happening from a performance perspective.
'Even though you're the manager of a team you're looking in as a supporter too; you want an outfit that will make people proud. That's what you're trying to create.
'And when that doesn't happen, as the old saying goes, players win matches and managers lose them, and the buck stops with the manager.
'And that weighs heavily whether managers admit that or not. I'd be very surprised if it doesn't weigh heavily on everybody in a role of that magnitude when it comes to poor performances.'
So, if the summer of 2024 was about surviving, then winter was about planning. They targeted the League as a means of making progress, which they did, reaching a final which they lost to Cork. We'll come back to that crowd in a minute.
But before we do, we must reflect on what Cahill endured last winter when there were times when he must have wondered if he had got the right job at the wrong time.
He says: 'The reality of it is that by the time I came into the job in 2023 most people in Tipperary knew that there was a big change coming, because unfortunately, we had a number of really top-class players who were coming towards the end of their inter-county careers.
'And the gap between what needed to come in and replace them, wasn't maybe fully ready at the time.'
The Tipp county board knew this - and to their credit they held their nerve last year when there were murmurs of discontent about the direction Cahill was taking the team in.
And rightly so because he has pedigree, having won All-Irelands at underage level with Tipp, prior to bringing Waterford to the 2020 All-Ireland SHC decider.
In three years, he has given Championship debuts to 14 of the panel who will travel to Croke Park on Sunday. His plan has been vindicated.
Cahill says: 'The meetings I had (with the Tipp board) when I accepted the role would have been around absolutely having time, and having patience.
'But unfortunately, when you're in a county as demanding as Tipperary not everybody sees that and understands that, and expectedly so.
'It's not too different to Kerry from a football perspective, the demands are really high, so that brings added pressure as well.'
And also pain.
Some of the criticism stung, the idea his teams were exhausted, the suggestion he was a poor coach.
Cahill opens up to say: 'The words that hit hardest were the ones around that Cahill flogs his teams, his excruciating training sessions. I felt it was disingenuous.
'Liam Cahill doesn't make it up as he goes along. People's comments on stuff like that not knowing what exactly is going on behind the scenes was lazy and ill-informed.
'I felt a little bit aggrieved that something so loose like that creates so much traction.
'There were other things such as 'Cahill plays with a sweeper'; Liam Cahill never played with a sweeper on his team in his life, ever.
'If it materialises it is because of the opposition forcing it. When you hear people talking about that, and Cahill's team is not coached right, I got really annoyed because I know the effort that goes in behind the scenes with Mikey Bevans, our head coach, and the work he does with the players on the field.
'It's hard not to listen to that but it does give you the motivation to try and prove people wrong.
'The reality of it is, the County Board had given me a three-year term to try and fix this thing the best I could.
'Yes, there was not much of a ship sticking out of the water, and it didn't look like it was going to come back up any time soon.
'But, I had huge belief in my ability to turn it around. I had huge belief in my coaching system, Mikey Bevans, I have huge belief in him, and Declan Laffan and his experience with what he had done on the club scene in Tipperary and Laois.
'So, I knew I had the right people around me so it was a case of getting it fixed.'
This morning he is an All-Ireland finalist, his critics silenced, his reform plans enacted, his point proven.
And yet he yearns for more, saying: 'For me, the first round of the Munster Championship in Thurles against Limerick, you could really sense it was starting to work out.
'I said it to the players from day one, you have to earn the Tipperary supporters' respect again.
'It is not lost on us as a squad, we are over the moon with the huge support we have and the energy there is around the place.
'We feel good. Cork are a great team. But we are there on merit.'
Their winter of discontent is now forgotten.