Only a few weeks have passed since Gerald McCarthy saw fit to resign his position as manager of the Cork hurling team as I write this. If we accept that a certain trinity of trust must exist between players, managers and county boards before All-Irelands can be dreamed about, it is probably safe to declare that Cork hurler's only highlight in 2009 will concern itself with this horrible row. When it started almost six months ago most observers of this type of conflict could state confidently that: - It would end in tears - There would be no winners and - The manager would have to resign And that is how matters panned out in the end and today, as I read the full text of his resignation statement, I had to feel sympathy for the man. Just why he put himself through this particular agony I can only guess but I imagine his genuine regard for Cork hurling was at the top of his list of reasons. It is often forgotten that these are real people with real families and everyday lives. The majority of managers and officials are amateurs in the real sense of the word and take on these jobs with the best of intentions. To read about such matters as death threats against him and boycotting of his mother's funeral should make all members of the GAA a little uneasy. Sometimes you are lucky enough to get a great manager and sometimes the pool is a little shallow. If you got the latter, most of my generation just sucked it up and got on with things in the hope he might be gone in a year or two. And of course the manager often took on a job knowing well he had plenty of bad players he had to work with. It's the circle of life I suppose but when players are heading towards and beyond thirty years of age they are playing out their careers to the soundtrack of a ticking clock and don't have the time to waste on a futile campaign. And so the easy target is the manager. And these latest developments, hot on the heels of the Waterford hurlers and Offaly footballers beg another question: where is this new militancy all going to end? It appears we live in an era where the rights of the individual are king and the greater good gets rolled over along the way. Once upon a time players played and managers managed but no more-the set up must be multi-disciplinary, collaborative and the top floor of the trinity is occupied by players rather than the politburo. Journalists once used to describe great individual performances on the field by using the descriptive 'hurling up a storm' but with the dust yet to settle in Cork one feels there is more to this story. Until the Cork public and supporters swung the debate back in favour of the players it looked like the endgame for the hurlers. And when the club officials met and voted overwhelmingly for the removal of McCarthy the game was certainly up. But how could those clubs, the same clubs that backed McCarthy as manager only a few short weeks ago show an alarming lack of consistency when corralled into a hotel conference room? I was amazed to see the Cork footballers row in behind the hurlers and they surely must have come close to loosing Conor Counihan, their highly rated manager, with that type of posturing. What will happen if the new manager throws a handful of the old faithful to the wolves? Walk out again? How can players who publicly slated Frank Murphy walk into Pairc Ui Caoimh for training as if nothing happened? Do they want another head on a plate? Time will tell I imagine but right now Cork appears to have plenty of that. At national level the stakes are very high: the spectacular 'GAA 125' Croke Park football and fireworks launch has been replaced by marches on the street, monster meetings in hotels and statements every second day. Players are not fools and now realise the ultimate power rests with them. Not technically of course but with media and public support of the players, they almost always occupy the moral high ground. Perhaps this was the main reason the association remained lukewarm about the GPA and yet word on the street is that the player's association is about to be recognised. The Cork fiasco has revealed a generational divide in attitudes. Retired players from the pre Celtic Tiger era are finding it difficult to reconcile the demands of the players with an amateur ethos. They worry about the games they happily spent many years of their lives playing and now coaching. They too made many sacrifices and trained as hard as the standard of the day demanded for success at All-Ireland level. Of course, this unseemly mess is not a new phenomenon and thus many of my arguments about stoicism and patience are rendered a little weak. As far back as the late 40s my own county of Mayo were the market leaders in player rebellion and so I can reflect with a little authority. Frustrated by the lack of support and organisational skills displayed by their county board the team of 1948 (loser's in that years All Ireland final to Cavan) simply had enough and wrote to City Hall with their demands. Two years later they had won the first in their two-in-a-row of Sam Maguires. Works every time then? Hardly - in the early 1990s Mayo agitated again and this time Brian McDonald, then the county manager, had to fall on his sword. You might recall the 'Pushing Cars in the Car Park' episode? Those half-truths took wings and all sorts of lampooning followed. It was not a pretty scene and many players today regret the hurt and stress they visited upon him. Again, real people, with real lives deserve better than to be caricatured in national papers and have their reputations dismantled in an almost casual way by young men, many of whom have just mastered shaving. Watch this space then. The 2009 season promises to see a face-off between Croke Park and players when it comes to the appointment of managers. I predict most players will want nothing to do with the selection process but county boards will be whipped into line and asked to display a modicum of human resource management skills when it comes to the interviews. Tweet

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