“Roscommon is a mad GAA county…”
Pride is a powerful thing.
It can create magic from the ordinary. Propel the average to greatness. Demand excellence. Refuse to settle.
Roscommon is a small county, numbers wise – in every sense. In the last 15 years, its people has had just one provincial title to keep them entertained. In the last 70 years? No All-Irelands.
But Roscommon is a proud county and, throughout the last decade, there has been a revolution of sorts stirring in east Connacht.
The unprecedented rise of the last three years is only the tip of the iceberg of what has been a generation of pure work. And pride.
Kevin McStay’s and Fergal O’Donnell’s exploits in Division One so far are just the latest in a supply line, turned pump. A supply line threatening to transform into a tide. And you can’t hold back a tide.
“A lot of work would’ve gone in over the last eight or nine years in Roscommon in relation to coaching and games development. We would’ve put huge effort into it, a lot of resources and a lot of work,” Seamus Sweeney knows better than anyone.
The county board chairman was there at the forefront in 2006 when he was brought in as coaching officer. There, he spent five years before being named as vice chairman and, this year, he chairs a Division One football outfit that has rode off the back of two successive league titles and promotions.
“We have a huge amount of coaches working with our underage squads,” Sweeney told SportsJOE. “They really are the unsung heroes of the GAA in Roscommon. They’re the guys and girls who come in and give their time freely to coach and to help bring along the players so they can compete for Roscommon on the field.”
And, by Jesus, it’s paying rich dividends.
Barring a Conor McManus-inspired Monaghan outfit barely seeing them off in their first outing with football’s top table, the Rossies have been unstoppable – actually unstoppable.
Ciaran Murtagh and Cathal Cregg have lit up the place at a canter and Kerry, Cork and Down have succumbed to this momentum as Roscommon literally shot their way into second place in the table, outscoring everyone across all four divisions.
There’s no fear there. There’s no inferiority complex. Roscommon have done the work. They’re comfortable with that.
“Look, in Roscommon, we’re ambitious but we’re realistic at the same time,” Seamus Sweeney said. “We’ll keep working at this, we have very good management teams in place, and we’re definitely ambitious, no doubt about that. Why wouldn’t we be? But we’ll keep working at it and see where it takes us.”
Why wouldn’t they be?
That was the message of Jim McGuinness’ recently-published book Until Victory Always: Why not us? He was sick of Donegal bowing to past masters or reputation. He wanted to build his own force that would respect their own talent and their own county. They did alright .
It has been that work though over the last decade that has ensured that the Rossies would be no flash in the pan.
It would’ve been very easy for John Evans’ talk of All-Ireland titles last year to blow up in their faces and for them to disappear off the radar. Sure, it wasn’t a good championship for them – not by the hype’s standards anyway but foundations have been put in place and it kept the overall project on track
“Our championship campaign last year was very disappointing after having a really successful league campaign but that’s the nature of the business of the GAA and of any sport,” Sweeney explained. “You can be up one week and down the next and that’s how the thing operates. Anyone who doesn’t realise that’s the way it works, they’re naïve.
“Most GAA people in Roscommon are realistic people,” he said of Evans’ talk of Sam Maguires last year. “We’ll keep working, we’ll keep the ship sailing. We’re working very hard in the GAA and business community in Roscommon. We have a lot of work to do yet, especially on our infrastructure. We’ll work on that and bring it up to date. We’ll keep putting the foundations down then we’ll travel the road and see where the road ends up.”
The road takes them up to Donegal next but not as new boys or visitors. As equals. This is where they belong now. They’ve spent long enough getting here.
The chairman insists that he is “very confident” that Dr Hyde Park will open its doors for the first time in 2016 for the visit of Dublin and Mayo to Roscommon in their last two home league games.
They have earned the right to host the big boys on home turf.
Because, quietly, without anyone really noticing it, Roscommon are the big boys now. From here, well, it’s just a case of seeing where the road ends up.
But a county is gripped on this journey with them. A county is united.
A county has risen.
