What they slag Charlie McCarthy about, we're not quite sure. Not anything that happened to him in 1978, though. Definitely not. How could they slag him? He captained the Barrs to win the All Ireland club title. He captained Munster to win the Railway Cup. He just happened to captain Cork as they completed the McCarthy Cup treble. He won an All Star too. An annus very mirabilis.

It was the third discrete Cork team McCarthy had hurled on. The first, after he'd made his championship debut at the age of 19 the previous year, was the one that threw open the gates of paradise in 1966. The second was the one that saw service between 1969 and 1972 ("a very good team that had a very good spell, even though we only won one All Ireland in that time"). The third was the three-in-a-row side. For the record, McCarthy's last championship appearance was a late vignette as a substitute in the 1980 Munster final against Limerick. He may not, as he dryly puts it, "have done much to improve a losing situation", but men who win five All Ireland medals may as well take refuge in modesty.

It may be long forgotten at this stage by other people how the three-in-a-row might have ended before it began. It isn't by McCarthy. The 1976 Munster semi-final pitted Cork against Tipperary in Limerick, a game they won by 4-10 to 2-15 but, according to their captain, could as easily have lost. "The three-in-arow wouldn't have been heard of otherwise. That was the start of our bit of luck."

And largely the end of it, for Cork had too much poise for Wexford in the All Ireland finals of 1976 and '77 and for Kilkenny in the 1978 showdown. What they lacked in flair they more than made up for in competence, coherence and intelligence. Panic, as they demonstrated when recovering from a wretched start in the 1976 decider, wasn't a word that featured in their vocabulary. (Sound like any other team we know. . ? ) Their greatest strength was, says McCarthy, their sense of brotherhood. "We were very united, from the selectors right down to the subs.

Like the team today."

Reconstituted after Cork's world had been upended by Galway in the 1975 All Ireland semi-final, the management was figureheaded by Fr Bertie Troy and included Kevin Kehilly, an enlightened physical trainer, and Christy Ring. History records that Ring the selector was initially a remote figure who gradually emerged from his shell.

For their part the awestruck players also took time to realise that this god descended among men was first and foremost a human being, and a shy one at that.

But extremely smart with it, as McCarthy recalls when reflecting on Cork's 0-13 to 011 victory in the 1978 Munster final. "Clare defended very well against a gale in the first half, were only a couple of points behind at half-time and were clapped in by their supporters. Christy was very good around the dressing room, very shrewd in vital things, and before we went back out he told us to try and hold them for the first five or 10 minutes of the second half.

Keep it tight, stop them from getting scores and we'd win, he said. You have to say these things, I know, but we did hold them. We tipped away, battled hard, scored a few points, mostly frees. It was a fierce battle. Our bit of experience helped us along the way. We never panicked." Again.

To Croke Park and immortality. Kevin Fennelly prodded home a fifth-minute goal for a transitional Kilkenny but, as against Wexford two years earlier, Cork reeled them in in their own time and were level at half-time. The scores were tied on three further occasions before Fennelly and Mick Brennan ran into one another, the sliotar careering loose for Tim Crowley to fire it over the bar and give the champions a lead they never lost thereafter.

Twelve minutes from time Jimmy Barry-Murphy hit the decisive score of the day, his half-hooked shot taking a deflection off Dick O'Hara and beating Noel Skehan.

"Not the best goal I ever scored but certainly the most important, " Barry-Murphy reports. Though Kilkenny fought back almost immediately for a Billy Fitzpatrick goal, Cork served out for the championship with points by Ray Cummins and, fittingly, their captain, who took a pass from Cummins and landed the last score of the afternoon with 38 seconds remaining. "Ray drew two players. I read the situation, knew what was coming, went in for the pass and put it over the bar. A nice way to finish. There was a bit of pressure on us after Billy Fitzpatrick's goal. You'd be afraid that if Kilkenny got on a roll they'd be difficult to stop. But our backs defended very well."

A day for defenders and a day for future managers.

JBM; John Allen, who came on for Tom Cashman 15 minutes into the second half, marked both Ger and Pat Henderson and ended up swopping jerseys with Frank Cummins; Donal O'Grady, who'd been a sub for the Munster final, narrowly failed to make the panel for the All Ireland and watched the game from the upper deck of the Cusack Stand; and, on the other side of the fence, Pat Henderson, Kevin Fennelly and Kilkenny's full-forward, who had an unhappy afternoon on Martin O'Doherty and whose weekend infamously didn't get any better when the losers were feted at the Courthouse in Kilkenny the following night.

But Brian Cody would also return.

History doesn't recognise full stops. While the men of 1976-78 recognised the worth of their achievement, McCarthy acknowledges, "If Cork win next Sunday, that'll be a fantastic achievement too. They're a fantastic team.

Some outstanding players.

But I just wonder is the same craic in hurling today. Maybe there is, but it's way more serious than in our time. And we were serious enough about it." Different times and a different game, he accepts.

"When our lads cleared it, they got it out of the danger zone. The Cork team today, one of the corner-backs gets the ball, he runs a bit, gives it to one of the half-backs. The half-back runs a bit, gives it to one of the midfielders. Okay, if we had a free way out the field, sometimes we'd hit it down the wing, but generally we played it more off the cuff."

There wasn't a minute of his 15 years in the jersey that McCarthy, a painting contractor whose son Cathal captained Cork to win the 1998 All Ireland minor title, didn't enjoy. Jim Treacy, who he faced in three All Ireland finals, was one of his most difficult opponents ("I had my good moments off him and my bad moments off him"), Ned Rea of Limerick another. Yet if there was such a phenomenon as a soft corner-back, McCarthy never had the good fortune to encounter him. "They were all tough that time. I was 10 stone, playing on guys of 14 stone. If I didn't move fairly quick, they would move me fairly quick."

They rarely managed that.

1978 ALL IRELAND HURLING FINAL CORK 1-15 KILKENNY 2-8 Croke Park, 3 September, 1978 Half-time Cork 0-7 Kilkenny 1-4 CORK M Coleman; B Murphy, M O'Doherty, J Horgan; D McCurtain, J Crowley, D Coughlan; T Cashman (0-1), P Moylan; J Barry-Murphy (1-1), G McCarthy (0-2), T Crowley (0-2); C McCarthy (c) (0-7, 0-5 frees), R Cummins (01), S O'Leary (0-1) Subs J Allen for Cashman, 50 mins; E O'Donoghue for O'Leary, 67 mins

KILKENNY N Skehan; P Prendergast, F Larkin, D O'Hara; J Hennessy (0-1, 65'), G Henderson (c), R Reid; L O'Brien (0-4, frees), F Cummins; K Fennelly (1-0), M Crotty, B Fitzpatrick (1-1); M Brennan (0-2), B Cody, M Ruth Subs T Malone for Fennelly, 53 mins; P Henderson for O'Brien, 58 mins Referee J Rankins (Laois) Attendance 64,155