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Cork GAA’s sponsorship deal with Sports Direct is not something players have discussed, but football captain Ian Maguire finds it positive to be associated with Premier League club Newcastle United.
Maguire spoke at the launch of Cork’s new jersey, which bears the logo of Sports Direct, a sportswear company run by Newcastle United owner Mike Ashley, who has faced questions in the UK about his employment practices. .
Ashley was called before a UK parliamentary committee to answer questions about labor practices, including zero-hour contracts and pay rates that are deemed below minimum wage.
When asked if the players had discussed criticism of the five-year deal with the retailer, which is supposedly worth € 400,000 a year, Maguire said: “That would never be something we would talk about.
“Sponsorship is never something that comes up in a dressing room. We have more important things to worry about from the player’s perspective: training, getting fit, tactics.
“Sports Direct for me is a store in Blackpool, but they obviously sponsor Newcastle. Being associated in that sense is positive.
“It’s exciting to have a new brand on board. There are new jerseys, new training jerseys. That’s strictly at the player level. It may be naive level, but that’s how I think about it.
“What comes with the sponsorship is something that will come at a later date. That is what the county takes care of.”
Reflecting on the past year, Maguire admits that every year of his inter-county career thus far has felt like a failure after losing a fourth straight Munster final in 2020, his sixth overall.
“Since I was involved with Cork football in 2014, every year is a missed opportunity when you are not reaching the later stages of competitions or winning competitions,” he told RTÉ Sport.
“Regardless of what happened in the year, Cork was knocked out in a Munster final. For the fourth year in a row we lost the Munster final. These are all missed opportunities. They all hurt.
“That loss to Tipp hurt and it was a missed opportunity. The beauty of the sport is that you can get up and go again, but what is probably a bit more difficult with this block is that I feel like I haven’t had a chance to go to training. back or correct mistakes.
“When you do your workouts at home, it’s just not the same as coaching as a team, or getting into the league or the McGrath Cup as you would in other years. You have the opportunity to move on to the next championship or the next league and we haven’t. had that opportunity, so this loss has probably been a bit more difficult than in other years.
“But we are big boys. You just have to get up. You have to learn the lessons and you have to go again.”
Reflecting on that surprise loss to Tipperary, midfielder Maguire, the only All-Star player from Cork, insists complacency was not to blame after a first championship win over Kerry since 2012.
“U21, I would have beaten Tipperary three times, but I would have lost to Tipp, and many players my age and below my age would have similar experiences, when I was younger,” he said.
“Tipperary would be my immediate rivals. Just take the age profile of Tipp’s team and the age profile of Kerry’s team, many of Tipp’s players would be my age older than Kerry.”
“I can only speak from my attitude, but I was learning the challenge.
“I suppose the element of complacency is something you will always consider when you beat a great team, but we beat Kerry and while there may have been a few drinks or whatever in other years, that didn’t happen because of Covid.
“You got dressed, you went home. It was a very different experience and I would have said it protected us from complacency because we were training again, getting back to routine.”
Cork could also be left without manager Ronan McCarthy for the foreseeable future after the GAA hit him with a proposed 12-week suspension for a group session on Youghal Beach last month.
“These are delicate times,” Maguire said. “Suspension of Youghal and Ronan McCarthy, these are all matters to be dealt with by the county board.
“It is an ongoing process. It is a matter for the county board and it would not be appropriate for me to comment on it.”
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