Wicklow chairperson urges public to get behind their clubs at championships time
Wicklow People
Today at 08:30
The Leagues are almost done and dusted, and now it's on to the fare that teams have really been training towards: the Championships.
The three main Gaelic Games organisations in Wicklow gathered together last Tuesday in Ballybeg House for the launch of this year's championships, all of which throw in shortly, but the Wicklow football championships will be the first to get underway. The football competitions' first rounds of action have been billed for a blockbuster weekend from Friday evening, June 11 onwards, and the excitement is already palpable.
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RTÉ News
14 hours ago
- RTÉ News
Nomadic guru Cian O'Neill seeks to add to trophy haul
Half a minute before the hooter sounded in their quarter-final victory over Armagh, the Kerry players and management had time to indulge in a premature celebration. David Clifford played an unremarkable 10 yard foot-pass back to Brian Ó Beaglaíoch near the Hogan Stand sideline and both players, along with members of the management team spontaneously turned to the Kerry crowd and started fist-pumping, triggering an elongated roar which swept around the stadium. The fact that it occurred after such a routine passage of play was, of course, what was so striking about it. The moment encapsulated the snarling defiance that Kerry brought to the game, having endured scathing commentary for the previous fortnight. Kerry have become very used to playing under the dead weight of expectancy. Only rarely are they afforded the opportunity to trade on 'ye wrote us off' spite, though they tend to flourish in such circumstances. There was a sense that the PR drive to appeal for the Kerry support to rally to them following the Meath debacle had paid off. One man who was conspicuously pumped up on the sideline was Cian O'Neill, who roared and punched the air with gusto as he saluted the Kerry fans in the lower Hogan. Back in the 1990s, Mick O'Dwyer landed in Kildare, a footballing backwater in the preceding couple of decades, to instruct them in the ways of winning football. At the end of last year, Jack O'Connor, after a disappointing end to 2024, turned to a Kildare man in O'Neill, prising him out of Galway to replace the departing Paddy Tally. O'Neill is almost as familiar with All-Ireland finals as the county with whom he's working. This will be his third All-Ireland decider in four years and his ninth in total. As it happens, he's only been on the winning side twice - in 2010, during his stint as S&C coach with the Tipperary hurlers and in 2014, when he was part of Eamonn Fitzmaurice's management team when Kerry turned over Donegal in the forerunner of this weekend's final. He's been around many of the glamour roles, almost like a Carlo Ancelotti of Gaelic Games without the celebratory cigars. Scanning his CV brings up constant reminders that 'oh yeah, he was there that year...' A former Moorefield player, O'Neill spent seven years as a physical education lecturer in UL. His first inter-county role was as a coach of the Limerick footballers' under Mickey Ned O'Sullivan, during which they were promoted to Division 1 of the Allianz Football League, albeit under the old 1A and 1B structure when there were 16 teams in the top tier. Crossing codes, he earned rave reviews as coach of Newtownshandrum in 2009, when they won the Munster club title, the last Cork side to do so until Sarsfields in the most recent campaign. "The difference (trainers) Cian O'Neill and Willie McCormack have made is unbelievable – even just having a fresh voice," Jerry O'Connor told the Examiner at the time. "There's a bit of bluffing going on around the place in clubs over teams who mightn't have a great idea of what they're doing, but with these lads everything is done for a reason. "If the lads say we'll be training for an hour and a half we'll be there for an hour and a half. It's top class." By that stage, O'Neill had been head-hunted by Liam Sheedy as Tipperary set about chasing down Kilkenny. He was their forward-thinking S&C coach during the 2008-11 years when they first took Brian Cody's team to the brink in '09, before crying halt on the five-in-a-row push the following year. It was a mark of O'Neill's standing within the squad that when Sheedy and Eamon O'Shea abruptly departed after the 2010 win, the players prevailed upon their Kildare-born coach to remain on, which he did for one more season. His one-year stint in Mayo in 2012 was successful but rather arduous given the uneven quality of the road from Limerick at the time. It was around then, he underwent spinal fusion surgery after being involved in a car crash a couple of years earlier. Nonetheless, he was again an influential voice as Mayo reached their first All-Ireland final in six years and a first for many of that generation. "He was one of the leading lights in terms of starting my career," Lee Keegan told RTÉ Sport this week. "He has a sharp eye for detail and he knows how to work with the players he has. He'll adapt gameplans to suit his players. For instance, he knew I was an attacking wing-back so he adapted our gameplan to exploit that and bring it out. "He was brilliant. It's no coincidence that everywhere he goes, he does well. Even in Kildare to a degree. They beat us to get to the Super 8s that year (2018)." His sole stint as an inter-county numero uno was in his native Kildare, the period for which many casual supporters will most remember him. Specifically, one campaign. Before that, he had three notably happy years as a coach in Kerry, where the travel was much less taxing and which brought another All-Ireland title. He later told the Irish Times he only left because Kildare came calling. His first season in 2016 was nondescript, though he later said he fell into a bout of depression after the Leinster semi-final loss to Westmeath. His second brought promotion to Division 1 and a Leinster final appearance and a nine-point defeat to Dublin, which was - strange to say - considered to be a proper moral victory in those days. The season which would go down as his most memorable and successful was the one which started out as the grimmest. The Leinster first round loss to Carlow was regarded as a humiliation of Pak Doo-Ik proportions and there were calls for O'Neill to go mid-season. They gradually righted the ship down the qualifiers by the time they were drawn out first to play to Mayo in the last-12. Cue one of the most famous stand-offs of the decade, as the GAA sought to stage it at Croke Park. O'Neill and Kildare refused to back down, going on the Six One and coining the phrase 'Newbridge or Nowhere', giving rise to the mural which adorns the gable wall near the ground. His defiance caught the mood of the time, an era in which Leinster counties were chafing under Dublin's oppressive dominance and aggrieved they couldn't get any serious provincial games outside HQ. Croke Park backed off eventually and Kildare, stirred up, beat Mayo in what is one of their most memorable championship wins since the 2000 Leinster final. The 2019 campaign was a comedown and O'Neill left Kildare, swearing that was that. He was appointed head of PE at CIT, now renamed Munster Technological University (MTU). Then Ronan McCarthy roped him into the Cork set-up for a couple of seasons, with much of his work done over Zoom as the pandemic descended. He was still there to help plot Cork's sensational upset of Kerry in the driving rain of Páirc Úí Chaoimh, aka, the Mark Keane game. His three seasons at Galway, which again saw him traverse the country, solidified his status as one of the game's most sought after coaching gurus. Two All-Ireland finals in three years in a county which hadn't reached the showpiece game in just over decades. At Kildare, the great Dublin team had been their white whale. With Galway, he played his part in bringing down the curtain on their era, with several of the 2010s greats departing after that loss. Pádraic Joyce was certainly miffed to lose O'Neill in the aftermath of the All-Ireland, with the coach returning to Kerry, where he had enjoyed his most concentrated period of success. Again, he confronts the brooding presence of Jim McGuinness on the same sideline. Eleven years ago, Fitzmaurice, O'Neill and co oversaw a gameplan which confounded their revolutionary opponent. Under different conditions, can he and O'Connor do the same this weekend?
The Irish Sun
4 days ago
- The Irish Sun
Diarmuid Connolly recommends drastic first step for whomever takes over as next Dublin manager
DIARMUID CONNOLLY reckons the new Dublin manager MUST get Brian Fenton back. Fenton, 32, shocked the GAA world by 3 Connolly was speaking exclusively to BoyleSports as a Gaelic Games ambassador ahead of the All-Ireland SFC final 3 Fenton only turned 32 in March 3 Dessie Farrell left the job after Dublin's All-Ireland quarter-final loss to Tyrone And Connolly has urged The former forward said: 'He'd be the first call I'd be making and I'd be saying, 'Right, Brian, give me a year, just give me a year'.' Fenton won seven All-Ireland titles, ten Leinster crowns and six All-Stars Connolly added: 'He's the twice Footballer of the Year, probably the most decorated Dublin footballer, and still only 32. Read More On GAA 'He has another four or five years left in him at the really top level. 'And I'm sure in his own brain, maybe taking this year out, doing a bit of travelling, might give him a new lease of life to come back and do something like that. 'I'd love to see Brian Fenton come back. He's such a leader.' The Dubs struggled without Fenton this summer and suffered their first provincial Championship loss in 15 years to Meath. Most read in GAA Football Tyrone ended their interest in the All-Ireland quarter-finals last month before Farrell quit as boss. Ex-Dublin star Ger Brennan led Louth to Leinster glory and Henry Shefflin picks RTE Sunday Game Hurler of the Year but wants no blame for selection for best 15 picks Connolly is unsure if his St Vincent's colleague will take the job as there are plenty of candidates. But he admitted the role could be a 'poisoned chalice' after their worst season in over a decade. He said: 'Is it a poisoned chalice coming and taking this Dublin side? I'd love to see one of the underage managers take it on. 'Ger Brennan has been touted, I don't think that's going to happen. Dec Darcy, maybe. There's no white smoke from Parnell Park. "The focus for Dublin is get back to your clubs and show what you can do because a new manager comes in with new ideas so everybody's in the shop window.' DIARMUID CONNOLLY was speaking exclusively to BoyleSports as a Gaelic games ambassador ahead of the All-Ireland SFC final.
Irish Examiner
4 days ago
- Irish Examiner
Kernan: Donaghy's Armagh time was stepping stone to Kerry role
Aaron Kernan reckons Kieran Donaghy's five years with Armagh were all part of a long-term journey towards a major management role with Kerry. Donaghy stepped down from his position as coach and selector in Armagh last week, leaving boss Kieran McGeeney with a significant hole to fill. Former Armagh defender Kernan said that the Kerry legend was a big part of the county's All-Ireland win in 2024, pointing to the special bond he helped create with his energy and enthusiasm alone. Four-time All-Ireland winner Donaghy, a towering midfielder and full-forward for Kerry, previously worked as a performance coach with the Galway hurlers and with IT Tralee's Sigerson Cup team too. Asked if Donaghy is a likely future Kerry manager, Kernan nodded. "Yeah, absolutely," said Kernan, who was speaking exclusively to BOYLESports as a Gaelic Games ambassador ahead of the All-Ireland SFC final. "Whether that is as a manager or a head coach or someone who is heavily involved within Kerry. "As much as we're grateful for everything he gave to Armagh football, you would have to imagine that that was all really a learning experience for him in terms of trying to take something back to Kerry, whether that's maybe doing a stint with Austin Stacks and then obviously you would have to imagine ultimately it would be with a view to getting involved in Kerry football and management. "So I think it started out maybe as a learning experience for him and then something that he just went full out and became completely ingrained in. "But yeah, you would have to imagine that somewhere down the line, the experiences and the learnings that he would have had over the past few years will go a long way to shaping him as a head coach or a manager somewhere in Kerry in the near future." Crossmaglen man Kernan, son of 2002 All-Ireland winning boss Joe, said that Donaghy was a huge personality in the Armagh backroom. "As an Armagh person, you couldn't but say fair play to him for being so committed," said Kernan, a coach with Sligo this year. "He has a young family, is busy with work, so to stick at something like that for five years given the travel that was involved was incredible. "His personality was huge. If you exclude what he could bring in terms of coaching insights, his personality was infectious enough on its own to have around the group because he brings so much energy and he instils so much confidence in those around him through his personality, through his own nature. "I think that's going to be a huge loss within the group because when you have someone like that who has been there and one it as a player, if he's telling you that you're going well, if he's telling you you're flying fit or your form's great, you tend to believe it when it comes from someone who has played in the biggest days and achieved everything there was to achieve. "So it's not a shock that he's gone because giving five years as he did was incredible. But I would say the biggest thing would be the camaraderie, the energy and the positivity that he brings around the group. The players will definitely miss him." Kernan reckons that Donegal will beat Donaghy's native Kerry in Sunday's final, 'by one or two', pointing to the Ulster champions' defensive ability firstly, but also their counter-attacking excellence when they win back the ball. He is disappointed that it will be the last game under the current Championship format though with the decision taken to switch to the current Sigerson Cup format for 2026. "As the season is closing, to me, I would have liked to see the new rules get a couple of years in the current format," said Kernan. "The new rules have been unbelievably positive, they've absolutely changed the landscape. "But just the way the season has went, and the amount of quality games that we've seen all across the board, it's just a pity that they are changing now. I'm not sure if the avenue is there to revert it back, or to vote to leave it as it is, but from my own personal point of view, I would like to see it stay for another year, maybe two years, where it gives you a proper trial period to see are the new rules benefiting long-term. "They certainly look like they are at the moment but I'd like to see them in the current format rather than everything being completely changed again next year."
