Tailteann Cup final
Down v Laois (Saturday, Croke Park, 3pm, live on RTÉ2)
IT was at a family wedding last month when it really started to hit home with Ciaran Meenagh.
Wife Orla is originally from Loughinisland, and Meenagh’s father-in-law, Eamonn O’Toole, was Down chairman when the pair first got together. Across the past couple of decades, he has watched as much club football in the Mourne county as almost anywhere else.
Having been starved of any meaningful silverware since 1994 - during which time his native Tyrone landed four All-Ireland titles - Meenagh knew all about Down’s history, and the love of the game.
But it was only when the Loughmacrory man was drafted into Conor Laverty’s backroom team that the desperation to end the famine, to restore pride in the red and black, became crystal clear.
“After we played Wicklow a few weeks ago, my wife’s brother got married and I had to leave straight away to go to the wedding,” said Meenagh, who finished last year as interim Derry manager following the shock departure of Rory Gallagher.
- Conor Laverty: Down players had slipped into a culture of accepting defeatOpens in new window
- From starstruck Cúl Camp hopeful to county captain - now Pierce Laverty hopes Down can take place among the big boysOpens in new window
- ‘We do have a couple of mavericks… I was a small bit in that category myself’: Marty Clarke hopes Down can help inspire another generationOpens in new window
“There was people there I hadn’t seen in years, we had a couple of drinks, and they are just bloody desperate to follow a team.
“If I was asked one thing repeatedly all night, it was ‘is there a team there coming?’ And so you came away thinking ‘f**k, it would be brilliant to give people an opportunity to follow a team’.
“I’d be an optimist. Looking at Down from a distance, and particularly after they played Derry in the McKenna Cup last year, I saw a lot of good players with a lot of potential.
“The more you work with people, the more time you spend with people, the greater the rapport and the greater the bond you build with them. I’m enjoying the company of the management group and definitely building a rapport with those players.
“All of a sudden momentum can build, and there is an awful appetite in Down. There’s a lot of good footballing country here with a lot of success from the past, but sometimes that can weigh on you then as well… that pessimism can become a factor that weighs on you as opposed to liberating you.
“It’s a fine line.”
The weight of that history should be an irrelevance to the class of 2024, most of whom weren’t born when DJ Kane lifted Sam Maguire 30 years ago. But it is because of that - because of the historic swinging ‘60s, because of the era-kickstarting ‘90s – that Down football is held to higher scrutiny, both inside and outside the county.
Over the last decade, the Mournemen have gradually descended the rankings, leaving them as Ulster Championship outsiders fighting to escape the third tier of the National League. Earlier this week, Laverty spoke of the damaging impact that had on the current generation.
A revolving door approach became the norm as players drifted in and out, leading to an ambivalence that spread from the field to the stands, poor results and falling attendances going hand in hand.
“Winning didn’t mean as much to them,” said the Kilcoo man.
“They got to a stage where they were accepting the level they were at, and they were comfortable in that.”
Laverty has steadied the ship, demanding a culture of compliance, of pride and professionalism. In his two years at the helm, the Down panel has been more solid, and more stable, than at any stage in recent memory.
The challenge now is to make that count.
After promotion and Tailteann Cup final near misses during the first 12 months, his side have already put one of those to bed by going up to Division Two in the spring. On Saturday afternoon, Down have an opportunity to right the wrong of last year’s defeat to Meath when they take on Laois at Croke Park.
Bringing Meenagh onboard has helped solidify already firm foundations. But he feels the legacy of those years before remains a hurdle the current group are still struggling to overcome.
“The biggest challenge this group of players have is confidence - there’s a fair few skeletons in the closet, there’s been some difficult years there, previous to this management.
“Last year, the nature of the defeat to Armagh in the Championship, and in particular not getting promotion - the game against Fermanagh, just pulling through the Antrim game - then Meath in the final… that, and I can still see it to an extent, creates some insecurities.
“Like, I see them physically, the amount of work they do, how hard they work at their game, the lifestyle they lead, the quality of the player that’s there. But sometimes when the pressure comes on, there are those things and that’s the challenge.”
Yet, even bearing that fragility in mind, Meenagh is in no mood to sugar-coat the significance of Saturday’s decider.
Following an awful 2022, last year brought a mood of cautious optimism back to the county. Winning the Tailteann Cup would have been the cherry on top of a very good first season under Laverty, but not winning wasn’t seen as a disaster either.
This time around, however, anything less than victory – and securing a place in next year’s All-Ireland Championship – would be a major body blow.
“There’s a pressure on it – there’s definitely a pressure, and that’s a good thing.
“To win a game like this, and not to be trying to hide it or trying to use cliches, I’m not into that… I’m into being straight. This is a big game for Down to win, it’s a big game for this group of players moving forward.
“They boys are at a brilliant age, you have a lot of lads in that 25, 26 age group, and then quite a number below that. That means the team should get better over the next couple of years.
“But getting a victory in a game like this here and more important, a solid performance that gives hope, a degree of relief and a degree of optimism moving into next year.
“Things could start to get exciting, because it is absolutely better to build a team over a period of years, with incremental growth as opposed to going from zero to there so, maybe in the long run, last year won’t have been a bad thing.”
Having been involved in Derry’s rise from Division Four to Division One, the Oak Leafs transformed from also-rans to All-Ireland contenders in the space of five years, Meenagh speaks with authority on the key junctures in a team’s trajectory.
Division Two football next year, and mixing it with the big guns in the All-Ireland, is no longer where Down want to be; it is where Down need to be.
“These are the games that are important in the journey and the lifespan of a team going forward.
“That’s why this team, I believe, would get great relief and great energy from winning a final in Croke Park - because it was difficult this year not to be playing Sam Maguire football.
“I found it difficult, I found that a challenge to be motivated for that bit. It’s a bit easier when you’re in a final and you’ve got that to look forward to, but that was a difficult period.
“What Derry did on the way through was they won these games. When Covid came there was a lot of things straightened out, the following year there was two groups of four in each [in the League], and they had a play-off game in Carrick-on-Shannon against Limerick.
“That game was on the 14th of June, 2021 and I’m telling you now, that was a nervy, error-ridden performance by Derry - but they won the game. They got promoted to Division Two.
“The performance this year against Westmeath in Croke Park is still something that privately will haunt all of us. In the Armagh game in Ulster, there was no pressure, no expectation to win the game from the outside. Apart from ourselves, we felt we were going to win the game, we felt we had done the homework and we had the game plan to win it.
“But this final is another game that is tricky because you’re expected to win, and you’re going to be favourites to win. That’s something that, rather than try and hide or shy away from it, we’re going to have to embrace that, and we’re going to have to deal with that.
“Things are being done right, and it’s like building a house; if the foundations are good and they’re strong, things will eventually come. Then it comes to a stage where, along the way, there are wee milestones that you have to try and build into the project.
“This final is definitely one of those where you could look back and say ‘that was a watershed moment’, whatever way it goes.”
TEAMS
Down: J O’Hare; P Fegan, R McEvoy, P Laverty; M Rooney, D Guinness, S Johnston; J Flynn, O Murdock; D Magill, J Guinness, R Johnston; L Kerr, P Havern, C McCrickard
Laois: K Roche; J Kelly, S Fingleton, M Timmons; S Lacey, B Byrne, E Buggie; D Larkin, C Heffernan; N Dunne, E O’Carroll, K Swayne; M Barry, E Lowry, P Kingston
