KEVIN O’CONNOR IS back at Cork City.
The defender, a free agent, will line out for the Leesiders for the remainder of this season, which is due to restart on 31 July.
25-year-old O’Connor has already enjoyed two spells at Turner’s Cross. He impressed under John Caulfield and earned a move to Championship club Preston North End along with team-mate Sean Maguire in 2017.
The Wexford native then returned to the SSE Airtricity League Premier Division side on loan in 2019, and began this season on loan at Waterford before the campaign was postponed due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
On 30 June, he was released by Preston along with several other players.
“I’m delighted to be back,” O’Connor said. “Cork is a second home to me, and it’s good to see a few old faces here. There are obviously only 13 games left so it’s going to be tough, it’s going to be a battle, but it’s the same for everybody in the league.
“We have to take it game by game and we need to try and maximise the amount of points we can take, so we want to hit the ground running.”
City boss Neale Fenn added: “I spoke shortly after the break about the need to bring some experience into the squad, and certainly Kevin O’Connor brings us that. He knows the club well and he knows the league well, which was important to me.
“We needed that experience in such a young group, so I’m delighted that he agreed to come here. He’ll bring some experience and knowledge to our younger players.
“We have a couple of targets that we’re working on from outside the league, so hopefully we’ll be able to pull those off and add a little more quality to our squad.”
Cork’s first game back is at home to Bohemians on Sunday, 2 August.
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Not to make light of it but 3.5 times more likely than very unlikely is still very unlikely. Loads of players played football and don’t have any issues and loads of people never played football and do have issues. The study also pointed out that deaths in general under the age of 60 were hugely reduced in those that played football compared to the general population. There is a lot more in this than just heading footballs gives you a neurodegenerative disease and the media reporting of it has been very irresponsible imo.
@Dino: Still, it’s significant enough to warrant a change in training practises & age grade football. Better giving people the knowledge so that they can make the choice. I obviously think people should participate in sport and stay active, but to do so with the full knowledge of associated risks and benefits.
@Joseph Blocks: is it significant enough? I haven’t seen anything to say it is. If the chances of football causing brain injury are 0.0000001 then 3.5 times this is 0.00000035 which is still insignificant. Don’t just read the headline
Ban heading and we might actually have a better game….especially in this part of the world!! Kids & teens definitely should not be heading the ball full stop… and they might actually learn to play ‘foot’ ball
Shocking although good more is known now. Balls are lighter too
@dublindamo: The dry weight has actually changed very little. However until the eighties balls would get very heavy when wet, which could well have caused the most damage when heading.