\u201cWe were very disappointed with how we got on against them in the round-robin. To overturn that in the final was huge for us.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s definitely a confidence booster that you can come up against a Limerick team that’s at the peak of their powers, stay with them for that long of a period, and just get over the line.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
That makes Sunday\u2019s league final against the Treaty all the more important.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you’re playing at this level, any bit of silverware is huge,\u201d O\u2019Leary adds. \u201cIn Cork in recent years, we haven’t had huge success at winning silverware, so we put huge emphasis on it.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s a great game to get two weeks before championship as well. With the crowd that’s going to be down there on Sunday, it’s huge.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
![\"Cork's](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/5022740_17_articleinline_2708081-B2_TEK_2346.jpg\" "\\"Cork's")
Cork’s Niall O’Leary and Eoin Downey challenge for the ball with Aaron Gillane and Shane O’Brien of Limerick. Pic: Tom Maher\/Inpho<\/p>\n
O\u2019Leary refers to the period after the All-Ireland final defeat to Tipperary as a grieving process. It was one that was kept suitably brief.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe’re well over it at this stage. The way the campaign goes, you’re finished, you lose an All-Ireland final, you’re playing championship with your club two weeks later. That grieving period filters out very fast.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe lads in the club know that as well. They don’t be long bringing you back to normal and getting you going again.<\/p>\n
\u201cLook, it was a tough one to take. For anyone, to lose back-to-back All-Ireland finals is tough. But we’ve taken huge learnings from it. We’ve had great help with a new psychologist, Gerry Hussey, this year as well. He’s done great work with us, so fellas have moved on big time.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
The corner-back role has changed across O\u2019Leary\u2019s hurling career. With one inside forward usually withdrawn, the Castlelyons clubman commonly takes the role of tagging the roaming corner-forward. But he doesn\u2019t mind being penned back on the edge of the square either.<\/p>\n
\u201cMyself and Se\u00e1n (O\u2019Donoghue) would be half messing and joking at times that \u2018You’re going out now again. You\u2019ve the handy one today.\u2019 But no, it is a nicer role. You’re not as stuck inside. You can have a bit of freedom out there, getting on the ball a bit more. I do love a competitive battle inside at times too, though.<\/p>\n
\u201cHurling wasn’t a big part of playing corner-back, but definitely in this day and age, you have to be a really skilful hurler to play there. It’s a great position. You have to be a competitive individual to play in there on your own. Some people hate it, some people love it, I suppose.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
O\u2019Leary acknowledges the rush for tickets is a struggle for fans, although he walls himself off from such requests.<\/p>\n
He remembers being one of them as a seven-year-old when the Liam MacCarthy Cup was last paraded through his village. The place was \u201cflooded with people\u201d and the idea of replicating those memories is a potent motivation.<\/p>\n
\u201cI can still remember the bus stopping in Castlelyons with Timmy McCarthy, The Rock, and Se\u00e1n \u00d3g getting off with the trophy. It’s definitely something I’d love to do in my career to come back to Castlelyons with it after seeing Timmy do it. I don’t look into it too much, but it definitely gives me inspiration.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Easter holidays mean O\u2019Leary won\u2019t get his usual feedback this Monday, but no doubt he\u2019ll get the debrief before too long.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt puts a small bit of pressure on yourself going out for a game. You\u2019ve to go to school on a Monday to make sure that these fellas can say, \u2018Jeez, you played well at the weekend, sir.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When Niall O\u2019Leary comes off the field, it\u2019s not the Sunday Game analysis that concerns him. It\u2019s the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":374906,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[2110,1964,61,60,112],"class_list":["post-374905","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-cork-sport","tag-cork-gaa","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/374905","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=374905"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/374905\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/374906"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=374905"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=374905"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=374905"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}