Recently we showed you 100 of Sportsfile’s best pictures from the year just gone. Now we are asking the photographers to give an insight into their favourites and the story behind the pictures.

Ray McManus

Cork Concentration

This picture comes from the middle of June and the Munster Hurling Championship when Cork beat Clare.

Before the game I was looking around for pictures of supporters or for something different and walked by this four year old Cork fan, Ciaran O’Brien.

He was just hurling away, very content, oblivious to the people that had begun to gather and swarm around Semple Stadium and the surrounding areas, and I was able to get this clean unposed picture of him honing his skills on a back pitch.

Dressed in his Cork gear and seasonal flip-flops, he studiously continues the ancient hurling tradition, another one for the next generation. Biding his time before seeing the giants of Cork and Clare do battle in the famous hurling field of Thurles.

See the full set of Sportsfile Images of 2014 here:

http://sportsfile.zeitsolutions.com/more-images/1412028/5000/