Brian Cody, to be fair, has always maintained a simple mantra as regards training. It’s hard to imagine him abandoning his philosophy. He may make changes to the personnel, but the policy will remain the same. Cones are a rarity, matches are the key to what he achieves.

About two years ago, a lesser name than Cody achieved success with a team. He purposely didn’t use cones to prove a point. He proved his point, and won the title, but he didn’t keep his job. There was an appetite for someone on bigger money who wanted to arrive thirty minutes earlier to litter the field with a decorative array of cones. Everyone said ‘Wow, this is amazing.’ The success came to an end, as did the mastering of the fundamentals of the game. The new trainer is deemed to be a better trainer by the players. From an outside perspective, it seems to be purely on the basis that he talks more cock and bull.

The game of hurling at all levels is suffering because the 'man with the cones' is seen as a modern day hero, and the man who doesn’t use them is deemed incompetent.

Despite the success of Kilkenny, the simplicity of Cody’s methods have not been bought into by some people who want to do the circuit making money from the game. Coaches have visited Nowlan Park watched what has gone on and refused to concede that their fancy methods are nothing more than a money-spinner as they travel the circuit year after year. They have watched but have learned nothing from the master. Cody isn’t in it for the money, therefore has no agendas, so putting on a show of expertise is not his thing.

I would estimate that in 70% of time spent on the field under Cody doing ballwork is basic game time and that percentage could be higher. It makes sense, the ultimate objective is that players play matches and win matches. The ultimate objective is not to play ‘join the dots’ with cones. There are coaches who spend less than 20% of their ballwork time playing games. If they won't listen to Cody, what chance has the ordinary guy?

Liam Sheedy attended a coaching conference in Limerick recently and also preached simplicity. Others have chosen to learn and have been rewarded. Joachim Kelly for instance took his Offaly camogie players to Nowlan Park a couple of years back, they looked, they listened and they learned, and it led to successive All Ireland titles. Several others have done the same. Brian Corcoran in his book ‘Every Single Ball’ bemoaned the lack of game time in training in the lead up to the 2006 All Ireland Final. Obviously what Cork did in 2004 and 2005 was successful but it would be interesting to see how it compared to what they did in 2006.

We are facing into the business end of the league and the championship is around the corner. Kilkenny despite not firing on all cylinders are on the right track. Cody can adapt his sessions to evolve around defending against movement, which he will. However if they do not lift the McCarthy cup this year, my great hope is that the team who wins it does so based on the Kilkenny training principles.

Hurling needs it, and perhaps if more and more teams are successful doing it, then more and more players will realise that it’s the way forward for the betterment of hurling in general. If you liked this article, tell other people about it...