*Seán O’Brien in action for Corofin. Photograph: Burren Eye Photography
SEÁN O’BRIEN’s sporting year began with victory in a Muay Thai bout in Thailand, he’s hoping to cap it off on Sunday by winning a second intermediate football championship in Cusack Park with Corofin.
On May 10th, the main sporting event in the county may have been Clare’s clash with Tipperary in Cusack Park when Brian Lohan’s side lost a second game in succession which ended their All-Ireland title defence.
As they made their way into the home of gaelic games in the county to support their clubman Conor Leen and the men in saffron and blue, a chunk of Corofin supporters were glued to their phones watching one of their other teammates take a shot for glory. On the other side of the world, Seán O’Brien was stepping into the ring in Sinbi Boxing Stadium in Phuket for his debut Muay Thai bout.
Muay Thai is also known as Thai boxing or the Art of Eight Limbs, it is a Thai martial art and full-contact combat sport that uses stand-up striking, sweeps, and various clinching techniques. The name Art of Eight Limbs refers to the combined use of fists, elbows, knees and shins.
Fight seven on the night saw Seán secure a decision victory over Ai Yao Srichan from Jordan. Travelling to Thailand was his first move of his current career break and the new sport was “a bit far away from the GAA club here”. The training helped his return to gaelic football and hurling with Corofin. “It has helped, a lot of people think I’m mad but I find a lot of personal growth can be found in combat sports, it was a great experience”. He told The Clare Echo, “the thing is you’re doing it on your own, there is a responsibility there to perform when you get into the ring because if you don’t then you will possibly get hurt. It is good definitely, sometimes it is nice to get a bit of a break from the GAA too as much as I love it, it is nice to get away from it and see different styles of training”.
His Muay Thai record stands at 1-0 from his outing in the 80kg middleweight division, “The record is 1-0, I did boxing for a good few years when I was younger and won a couple of Munster titles, I took a bit of a break but I always wanted to go back, of course Mammy and Dad wouldn’t agree with it too much because it is a dangerous game. I was boxing for four or five years with Kilfenora Boxing Club, once I hit eighteen or nineteen I had to go to college so I didn’t bother continuing it then but it was always something I was interested in getting back to”.
Though Seán may have acquired a set of particular skills in Thailand, it hasn’t led to less opponents trying to take him down on the GAA fields. “It might go the other way and they might think they can get under my skin. There is a lot of discipline to be found in it so I would try not to react if I can,” he quipped. Were tempers to flare on the hurling field, he finds the hurley can be a distraction, “I’d probably just drop the hurley and go for them, the hurley would only be in my way”.
Both his parents and two older sisters would prefer if Seán stayed out of the ring. “I’m getting a bit of pressure from the family not to keep going, I love the training side of it but it can be lonely in the ring, it is a dangerous game really and I want my health, I don’t want to jeopardise it”. That said, he wouldn’t rule out another challenge, “I might get back in the ring, it could be MMA too we’ll see, I might throw another spanner in the mix”.
Twenty five year old Seán was part of the last Corofin side to win the Clare IFC in 2021 and represented the club at senior up until their relegation last season. Their wins over Shannon Gaels and Clondegad in the knockout stages demonstrated they had character to match their skill, he felt, “I think we’d two really tough games to be honest with the quarter-final and the semi-final which has hardened us, we’ve good footballers but we’ve shown we can dog it out when it comes to it too”.
There hasn’t been a noticeable difference in the standard of teams at senior and intermediate, O’Brien felt. “I’ve played intermediate before this year obviously and senior, I’ve plenty experience of both but I have to say I don’t notice that much of a difference, you would assume that you might be able to run past lads a bit easier but I don’t find that to be the case. The intermediate teams that we’ve played this year have all been good at holding onto the ball, there naturally will be a bit of a difference but I wouldn’t say it is huge from my personal experience”.
Since their intermediate football success in 2021 and hurling equivalent in 2023, the Corofin squad has noticed a busy departures gate due to emigration and retirements. “When one goes it kind of sets the tone for a lot of people, it is a pity but at the end of the day people don’t really care about who is gone away they will just look at the results and say Corofin are gone poor, it gets to the stage where you have to stop feeling sorry for yourself and try get on without them. This year we’ve really made a push with the football, we’ve twenty good lads there now which we might not have had last year as such, we’ve good depth, the lads might come back or they might not, we’ll leave it up to them”.
Currently on a career break from his role as a Technical Agricultural Officer with the Department of Agriculture where he is primarily based in meat factories, most frequently in Tiermaclane, he will be setting flight again in the very near future, “I’m going to Australia as soon as this is over,” he confirmed, a visit to his older sister in Melbourne is part of the itinerary.
Seeing team mates get a taste of another part of the world is among the reasons for Seán’s own travels. “It is a mix of everything, it is not that I want to go as such, it is just I don’t want to have any regrets down the line. I’m farming at home, I’m an only son so I have the chance to go now for a few years, if I don’t I probably won’t ever get the chance, I’ll be going farming soon enough and that’s it”.
For the past five months, he has been labouring on a building site along with working on the family farm in Kilnaboy. “I’ve five or six months of labouring done on a career break and I’m anxious to go at this stage. You apply for a year at a time with the career break, they say you can go for up to five years but I don’t know if there’s any guarantee that you would keep getting the more years added on, I don’t want to spend all my time here, I didn’t take a career break for that”.
With a cow calving on the farm, he ended up running a few minutes behind schedule for training in Páirc Finne on Tuesday last. Punctuality can sometimes be impacted due to the farming commitments, “It depends on the time of the year but it does happen sometimes, in fairness we’re a country club so the lads are accommodating, it can be stressful because sometimes you feel like you’re being pulled and dragged but it is what it is if I can’t make it then I can’t make it because you have to look after the cattle”.
Recovery is aided by working on the farm, the past pupil of Ennistymon Vocational School maintained while pointing out some of his teammates have a much handier lifestyle. “Kevin (Keane) definitely isn’t too busy anyway. I’m a big believer in there’s movement in recovery, I think the more you move the better you recover. A couple of weeks ago we had a game there and I changed my routine a bit, I didn’t do much prior to the game, usually I would do something but I ended up getting a tweak in my back and I’m convinced it was because I was relaxing all day, I reckon the more movement the better”.
Ahead of Sunday’s final, O’Brien plans to be getting plenty of movement in before the ball is thrown in. “Different things work for different people, I try not to think about it as much as I can, there’s plenty of time to think about it on the day, just stay busy and training, don’t overthink it like. I wouldn’t say that the farm is too busy that you don’t have time to think, it is not too busy, you have the odd evening like, Dad is at home and he looks after most of it really, I’d be busy enough between working, farming and the bit of training, it is non-stop but that is the way I like it”.
During their three seasons in the top tier, Seán lined out at midfield while he was centre forward for their narrow semi-final win over Clondegad. “I know I might be centre forward but the lads will tell you I’m not the most natural scorer in the world, I like to play a roaming role, get around the pitch as much as I can, bring energy to it, anywhere around the middle I’m pretty happy with”. Though he is sceptical of his own shooting skills, he said not to write off chipping in with a two pointer before his travels recommence.
An assist for Gearoid Cahill’s thirty fourth minute goal in their semi-final was provided by Seán after making a tremendous run up the field. “Obviously on the papers you will see the scorers and on the radio they will talk about them but the lads within the group are all that matter at the end of the day, you know the few auld lads on the sideline know what they are looking at as well, they are the ones that matter, you have to do what you are good at, I’m athletic but I could drive the ball wide anytime”.
Wing-back was his spot for the Corofin hurlers who were relegated to intermediate following defeat to St Joseph’s Doora/Barefield. Dual codes is just part of the Corofin mandate, he said, “it is pretty much the standard here in Corofin, everyone plays both from a very young age, it is very hard to choose between one”. He added, “If you got relegated from the hurling and you didn’t play football you’d have a long winter thinking about it but with this you get to switch over, you can move on quickly, you have to gather yourself”.
Securing promotion in the football would ease some of the hurling relegation pain, he said. “For our own selves really, you can talk about other people but it is nice for ourselves within the group because we do the work so it would be nice to get an intermediate championship under the belt but we’re not taking Cooraclare for granted, that is for sure”.
Peadar O’Brien’s familiarity to the side as manager and Mark Rafferty’s input as coach has aided Corofin, O’Brien believed. “Me and Peadar have been involved in teams for as long as I can remember. Mark is new and has been a great addition to the club, we’re glad to have him”.
Five months ago his teammates watched him in the ring on their phones as they made their way to Cusack Park, as they make the same journey he will join them in a different ring as the curtain raiser to the Clare SFC final. “It is brilliant, you’d imagine that a lot of people might be inclined to go to both games, the bigger the crowd the bigger the occasion, I don’t think it is going to bother us too much, we will just focus on ourselves”.
