PATRICK HORGAN SAYS he was delighted with the 1920 commemorative jerseys that the Cork hurlers and footballers wore during the league.

Cork star Patrick Horgan says he doesn't practice frees much. Sam Barnes / SPORTSFILE Sam Barnes / SPORTSFILE / SPORTSFILE

The shirts were specially designed to honour the memory of Tomás Mac Curtain and Terence MacSwiney, prominent figures who were both Sinn Féin members and former Lord Mayors of the Leeside city.

The hurlers donned the jerseys for their Division 1 league clash with Limerick at Páirc Úi Chaoimh, where they suffered a two-point defeat.

Horgan, who finished that tie with 0-17 that day in February, says he was disappointed they couldn’t wear the black and red jerseys for the rest of the season.

“They were mint,” he begins.

I was hoping they’d go for the year. We’re back to the red now the next time we play. It would have been nice to get the season out of them but they were mint and we got to keep them after so that was nice as well.

“We found out about a week before [about the commemorative jerseys]. We got sent a picture telling us this was what we’d be wearing for the Limerick game and we were all buzzing and so delighted.” 

The hurling league games that took place that weekend provoked some frustration among fans in relation to the high number of frees that were awarded.

On the Saturday, Dublin’s clash with Wexford in Croke Park produced a litany of frees, with referee Johnny Murphy also dishing out 16 cards.

Cork and Limerick’s meeting the following day saw Horgan and Limerick forward Aaron Gillane score a combined 0-26 from placed balls.

Limerick boss John Kiely was visibly disgruntled by the repeated disruptions to the game, while Anthony Daly echoed those frustrations on RTÉ’s Allianz League Sunday.

“I don’t really know what to make of it,” Horgan replied when asked for his take on the stop-start nature of those games.

Players don’t really get into it much. You never anything from players about it. The only thing I would say is if the referee thinks it’s a free, he has to blow it. [You can't] have a situation where they’re gonna let it flow just for the sake of the people up in the stand wanting it to.

“If they see a free, they’re gonna blow it. We’ll just play [and] let them do their job. That’s really all we can do.

“If they’re gonna blow the whistle, they’re blowing it for a reason. Especially with hurling, there’s so much “nearly.” It’s nearly a free or just about a free. If they blow it, they obviously see something that they think they should be blowing for.”

While those interruptions to the game can be unsettling for players hoping to score from open play, it offers scoreable opportunities to free-takers like Horgan.

The Cork captain is one of the proficient players in the country from dead ball situations, but it’s not an art that he spends too much time perfecting.

He has a routine that he has developed over the years, and he sees no great need to change it now.

“I actually don’t practice them that much. I would have practised a lot more before but I think it’s just I have a routine and good or bad I’ll stick to it and I think that’s probably the key to it. I’m not going to change anything up for the sake of it, just try and keep that rhythm more than anything.”

Cork failed to reach the Division 1 quarter-finals in 2020 and will now face a long wait before the Munster round-robin series begins.

Horgan isn’t too worried about break though, and insists that the nine weeks until their provincial opener against defending champions Limerick “will fly.”

“We’ll train for the next two weeks with Cork and then back to the club for April, so that’s six weeks gone. Nine weeks are gonna fly and hopefully we’re gonna be out our best when it comes around.”

Patrick Horgan was speaking at the launch of the GAA Super Games National Blitz Day in partnership with Sky Sports

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