Brian Hurley
By John Harrington
Brian Hurley is ready to give the Cork footballers a much-needed boost by returning to duty after a long injury lay-off.
The explosive inside-forward has been out of action since ripping his hamstring off the bone is a freak accident during a training match with the county team eight months ago.
He’s set to feature for his club Castlehaven in a league match against Ballingeary on Sunday though, and hopes to be also able to pull on a Cork jersey again in the very near future.
“I’m nearly there now,” said Hurley today at a press-conference to announce a partnership between the GAA and the RNLI aimed at reducing the number of people who lose their lives though drowning in Ireland.
“I've a lot of work done. It's been 8 months since the 2nd of March.
“I think I've the work done, it's just a matter of getting games underneath my belt now. Playing a full game on Sunday with the club in the league so that'll be a good start.”
Hurley’s injury was similar to the one that ended Paul O’Connell’s rugby career. His hamstring was ripped right off the bone and required surgery to reattach it.
As soon as he suffered the injury he knew he was in serious trouble.
“Yeah it ruptured off the bone four inches,” says Hurley. “It was a pretty major injury. There was a lot of bleeding inside it but I knew straight away I was in trouble the minute I did it.
“I never felt pain like it. It was unbearable. I recall biting my hand on the floor. I just knew straight away that I was in serious trouble. I never pulled a hamstring before but I just knew the pain, it was horrific.
“Two lads coming at me, I went to go on my right, my right leg stayed, I went to push left and it kind of slipped out, I did the splits, it was like ripping a shirt.
“I could hear it ripping up the whole way, it went to the top of the highest point of it and it stopped there. It ripped as much as it could really."
Not being able to play football for the past eight months has given him a whole new appreciation of not just the sport, but what it means to be physically healthy.
“100%, it opened my eyes massively,” says Hurley. “I can remember the night I came home from hospital after getting surgery. Going down on the car, a bumpy road was digging into me, and I was saying, 'Jesus, was this what I'm in for?'.
“Even trying to brush my teeth that night, I was in a brace and I can remember trying to get my head underneath the tap to wash out my mouth and I couldn't.
“That appreciation alone opened my eyes massively. Getting in and out of bed, putting on my socks, small things like that.
“It just opens your eyes, how lucky you are to play football and be active. There's other people out there that are not so lucky. You have to appreciate what you have."
The RNLI and the GAA have announced a major partnership aimed at reducing the number of people who lose their lives though drowning in Ireland.
Hurley’s return will be a timely boost for a Cork team that’s at a very low ebb after last weekend’s Allianz Football League Division Two defeat to Clare.
They’ve won just one of their four League matches so far in the campaign and are in danger now of being dragged into a relegation scrap.
“It hasn't gone our way and we just keep our heads down,” says Hurley.
“We have to be positive going forward and just go back to the drawing board and try to get everything back into the game-plan and get everything to work.
“I can only look at it on my own behalf. I've been out of the panel the last few months. I've to look positive at my own thing. I've to get myself back into the panel to help out the lads.
“That's all I can do on this side of it. Obviously it's difficult in certain ways, you're listening to people and they're very negative but in your own head and in the group we have, we're very positive and we have to be positive.
“There's a long year there yet. At the end of the day, we're amateurs, we don't go out to lose, we don't go out not to perform.
“We train hard, we train very hard and we try to come out and sometimes it doesn't come off. As I said we'll keep our heads down and hopefully things will come right for us.”
Hurley is confident that things will eventually turn around for the Rebels because they have too much talent not to improve their results.
“Oh 100%,” he says. “Look at the talent we have. We've Eoin Cadogan, Michael Shields - two All-Stars, Colm O'Neill an All-Star. We've serious potential. Alan O'Connor, how many games has he pulled Cork out of?
“There's a lot of fellas coming back. Alan hasn't come back, younger fellas, Powter, Michael Hurley, Eoin Cadogan to come back, Jamie Sullivan to come back, myself. We need to push on and come united together. I think there's no question about our talent.”
