Ciara O'Sullivan determined to put bitter defeats behind her

"That did drive me. It's important that you just didn’t go out there to represent yourself. You were representing people you never even met. And they got a kick out of it, all over the world."

So said one of Kildare’s greatest ever footballers, Johnny Doyle upon his retirement from inter-county football in 2014.

That sense of responsibility never left the Allenwood man, who starred at 45 to propel his club back to the top flight by winning the intermediate championship last year. All while coach and selector of the Kildare seniors.

Not for him, the glib statement about doing it for others. He meant it. He lived it.

Ciara O’Sullivan seems a bit shocked by the notion that there are sportspeople that will refer to 'doing it for the supporters,’ but are doing it by rote. Ticking a box. Not cognisant of what that actually means.

Surrounded by a slew of young children, mostly but not exclusively girls, brought to the Cork Camogie Grounds on Castle Road for an open night ahead of tomorrow’s Glen Dimplex All-Ireland senior camogie final against Galway (5.15pm, live on RTÉ2), the Newcestown attacker is utterly aware of there being a greater cause.

"There’s a girl here that has a scrapbook full of photos from every time she’s with us over the last two or three years, and she's just adding to it every week, newspaper articles and photographs. And it's brilliant when you see that. It makes you want to play, because you're playing for them as well as the pride in Cork," says O’Sullivan.

O’Sullivan was that girl once too but now, when she is giving autographs, she is sharing canvasses with the traditional giants of Cork sport.

"I remember getting signatures off every Cork player, and then you'd be going home studying whose signatures was