This week marks the culmination of a journey that originated 35 years ago at St Jarlath’s College for Pádraic Joyce and his bringing together a Galway team to face Armagh in the All-Ireland final on Sunday. Joyce, together with selectors John Divilly and John Concannon, commenced their football-imaginative journey while they were fledgling years at the renowned Tuam. Later, Micheál O Domhnaill, who was also part of the same Galway squad, appended to the mix.
Concannon reminisces about their long-lasting friendship that began during their first school year. From the onset, they had a knack for forming hypothetical squads, representing the football teams they were part of. He recalls their young football years spent together and the intimacy they’ve maintained.
Throughout their football journeys, they have always pondered over one day managing the Galway team. As they convene this week to form the team for Gaelic football’s most significant event, they reflect on the refinements undertaken over three and a half decades.
Starting from their school’s senior team, St Jarlath’s College, they scrutinized each player’s best fit and who should make the cut. The process extended to their own club teams, like Divilly’s Kilkerrin-Clonberne, Concannon’s Milltown, or Joyce’s Killererin. And finally, the formation of the Galway team was brainstormed along each match, with positions being debated and discussions carried around the proper line-up.
The formidable St Jarlath’s team of 1994, which won the Hogan Cup and featured the likes of Michael Donnellan, and Declan and Tomás Meehan – the All-Ireland senior title winners of 1998 – was one of the early successful outcomes of this trio’s collaboration.
We’ve successfully achieved a bench that performs consistently, even though we had many absences in the league games which initially seemed ill-timed and problematic. Maintaining our Division One status in Galway was a top priority at the time.
Although being short of big-name players wasn’t ideal, the break may have proven to be beneficial for them. The playing experience and league time that the younger fellas gained was a silver lining indeed.
We are proud of our 39 skilled players, some of whom, despite being experienced, had never previously participated in a semi-final or final game. We believe that this wealth of experience has served us well in tight matches, particularly against teams like Dublin and Donegal.
Our failure to secure a victory against Armagh in the final group game of the All-Ireland series for the second year running sidetracked us to a longer route involving three games in a span of 14 days. However, playing the matches back to back, screenshotted against Monaghan, turned out to be a positive twist, especially as we had drawn the reigning champions, Dublin, in the quarter-finals.
Frankly speaking, drawing Dublin was perhaps the best outcome. Our lads needed no extra motivation to play against an opponent as renown as Dublin. Everyone understands that to defeat the best, you must play at your best. Motivation was at its pinnacle, and complaints of sore bodies and stiffness evaporated as the players eagerly anticipated their play in Dublin.
Despite the challenge of playing three games within three weeks, we emerged successful, a rare achievement as per the stats. With just 70 minutes to go before hitting our annual target of winning the All-Ireland, we remain committed to our goals, said Concannon, the area manager with Permanent TSB in Galway, who also had a hand in setting our goals with St Jarlath’s team.