Wow this is very hard blow. You have some thoughts how you're gonna be able to keep the team together?
“I get it, Michael,” Conor said, picking up another handful of his personal things and putting them in the cardboard box on his desk. “It’s just I can’t see myself doing another run at it.”
“Conor, you’re not thinking about this properly,” Michael said, pretty much chasing Conor around the room as he was packing up his things. “Tell you what, €350 a week, I pay for your rent in the first year and you get 80% of any compensation if someone comes in for you in the meantime.”
Conor stopped packing up. “So that’s your offer?” he asked, raising his eyebrows at O’Donovan.
As a former salesman, Michael O’Donovan knew that Conor’s pause in movement and speech was a cue for him to push harder on the product he was selling. “Think about it,” he said, grabbing Conor’s forearm. “Two years, security in your job for two years! The opportunity to build this club from the ground as you have done for a year and six months already!”
“Michael, the thing is: I’ve got into a few bad habits while I’ve been here. Essentially I am addicted gambling. Obviously not on football games, just casino games and poker.” Conor said, feeling a huge weight lifting from him as he finally told somebody.
“I understand,” Michael said, looking down and stroking his beard, thinking of the right words to say. “We can get you help if you want it and want it to be done here. Now I know that I would be able to handle the situation a lot better with regular support, I want to give you an opportunity to dig yourself out of this hole.”
Conor let out a sigh of relief as he smiled for the first time it felt like in months. “You’re a great man to work under,”
“With,” Michael said, butting into Conor’s sentence. “You don’t work ‘under’ me, you work ‘with’ me. I just pay your wages, that’s all the difference is.”
“Right,” Conor said, smiling again at what O’Donovan said. “Well you have to appreciate that I need a little more time to think about this because committing two more years of my twenties is a big decision, but I do love this club and I love working here with the lads and yourself.”
Conor began to unpack the things in his cardboard box and lay them all back out on the table.
“Just send over the papers with everything on it, I like making my decisions with the facts in front of me.” Conor said.
tedbro20: We're slowly reaching the conclusion of where Conor ends up for 2021 now!
Justice: A really gutting result for everyone involved at Cobh. There is no acceptance from Conor just yet, only words...
Scott: There were serious lapses in judgement from the boardroom all the way onto the pitch despite a great season, the summer departures taking a lot of the oil out of the machine past June.
Wolf: It will take better contracts, that's a given but there needs to be improvement in the playing squad regardless - some of the players that played simply aren't up to scratch for a promotion-chasing sides whereas players used to pressure like O'Hara and Turner can handle it.
