We have them now boys.
The whole world is against us. Anybody that’s not inside the four walls of this bloody dressing room will get a kick out of watching us get destroyed.
They don’t give a damn about us so why the hell should we care about them?
This game, it’s all about winning and we’re going to stick it up to these boys when we beat them. We are going to beat them.
By hook or by crook, we’ll do whatever we have to and to be honest it doesn’t matter if the whole world hates us for the way we do it. Because if we win, that’ll be more important. That’s the important thing here.
It’s one game at a time. It’s 70 minutes of guts for garters stuff. But the war starts beforehand. The war starts whenever we want it to start and we’re going into battle on our own terms.
We’ll win or we’ll die on our sword.
Make them wait
The referee has blown the whistle five times. He’s even came in and knocked on the door. It could be at half-time or it could be before the game even starts, but the enemies are out on the pitch and as we peak out at them through the dressing room window, it’s clear as day the boys are quaking in their boots.
They’re just walking around the pitch, kicking the odd ball. It’s freezing too and and they’ll be cold by the time the game starts.
Let them wait, like Mayo did to Kerry in MacHale Park at the weekend.
“A pet hate of mine lads, and Mayo were at it the other night,” said Wooly on Thursday’s GAA Hour. “I don’t think there’s any place for this. It’s one of these tricks on a cold night.
“I texted Billy Joe Padden to find out if Kerry were out early and if Mayo were out late… but it was Mayo, the linesman had to go in to get Mayo out.”
“The other team are gone out, and your manager says eff them, we’ll wait in here. He continues to talk and leaves the other team out in the cold.”
They always hated us
“These lads always hated us. They’ve come down here into our back yard, and do you know what lads, they think we’re soft, they think we’re useless.”
“Their two mangers were chatting about us at the semi-final lads, do you know what they said lads? One of them said to the other, ‘that’s the job done, the lads we’re playing in the final are no good.”
“How does that make you feel boys?”
The stare
Leave your dressing room door open. Congregate just inside it. Stare those feckers out of into their own dressing room. This is your turf. Your time.
Beastly warm-ups
You could easily do what Corofin did to Castlebar on it when the stewards made the Castlebar Mitchels players jump a wall to get onto the pitch.
That must have really put the Mayo men off.
You could send them out to the bog down at the bottom corner of the field for the warm-up.
Or you could just do a Davy Fitzgerald on it, and go bloody mad altogether.
This is war.
“One year, we arrived at a game with LIT, togged out, and were meant to come out of the dressing-rooms a certain way but we parked up the bus and we actually ran through the bushes at the far side.
“The other team weren’t expecting it at all. I was part of that brigade that day,” recalled LIT player Jackie Tyrrell.
Quick feet outside dressing room
Make sure you’re right outside their dressing room door. Make sure every single one of you is wearing steel studs. Make damn sure that you make one hell of a racket with every step.
Roar 1-10 like your life depends on it.
The lads inside will be bricking it.
“We always liked you lads”
The battle may be over, but the war lasts forever. The mind games wage on, even after you’ve dumped them home and out of the championship.
The next game. The next throw-in.
Your manager goes into the opposition dressing room and tells the other team how much he loves them and what they do.
“You’ve a great set-up here lads, you really do. We always love coming down here for a game because we know it’s going to be fair and sporting lads and you always put it up to us.”
“Your pitch is one of the best in the country. We’re big fans of you lads, and it really could have went either way today.”
Fake it until you make it.
Cold showers
Then, after buttering them up as your best friends, let them go into those freezing showers and see what they think of you now.
“That’s typical of these lads.”
In the end does it actually matter? Does the motivation not come from within, or do these siege mentalities work a treat? Have your say in the comments.
