‘For a smaller county, the opportunity to play a final in Croke Park is massive’
Leitrim boss Moran opposed to idea of ditching League finals
IT CAN be taken as a measure of what Andy Moran achieved last weekend that Leitrim will now grace Croke Park as many times as the Mayoman played there in All-Ireland finals.
In booking their place in Saturday’s NFL Division 4 decider against Laois, it will be the sixth time in their history that Leitrim play out a competitive fixture in Croke Park; a number that should resonate with Moran in more ways than one.
Leitrim have lost in their previous five visits to HQ – a League semi-final against Derry in 1959, All-Ireland semi-final against Dublin in 1994, a regular League game against the same opposition a year later, the 2006 Tommy Murphy Cup final to Louth and the 2019 Division 4 final against Derry.
Moran’s playing career hit its peak in his player-of-the-year season in 2017 when he played in his sixth AllIreland final, but he never managed to get his hands on a winner’s medal.
Operating at a different level now, he insisted yesterday that the buzz of going to Croke Park remains the same.
And it is also why he fumes at suggestions that the League finals should be scrapped to create some breathing space in the GAA’s condensed season.
‘To be honest, it has been amazing. Leitrim have played in Croke Park five times in their history, this will be the sixth time that they have played.
‘I’ve heard a lot of talk over the last couple of weeks about cutting League finals, but the main attraction for a manager like me or anyone that is with a smaller county, is the opportunity to play a final in Croke Park. It is huge.
‘That was our target at the start of the year, we are there now.
‘The people of Leitrim are really getting in behind it and it is exciting for the whole county. I’ve played there multiple times, but I’m as excited now as I ever have been,’ said Moran at the launch of the Connacht Football Championship.
In truth, Moran has endured both highs and lows in his three seasons as Leitrim boss. Last year, they became the first team to lose to New York in the Connacht SFC, and crashed out of the Tailteann Cup without even making the knock-out rounds.
However, as with most teams in the basement, Moran’s priority was getting out of a bottom tier after two seasons of near misses.
‘Division 4 is great to watch,’ he said.
‘You have a team like Wexford, who have won their last four games by more than 40 points, a really exciting team, a team that could really do something, I think, in the very near future.
‘For us to finish ahead of them is a huge achievement.
‘You cannot underestimate it. For the last two years we got to eight points twice, we won four games twice, we were always saying if we could win that fifth game we’d get over the line, and we did. That is the way it ended up.’
Leitrim’s success this season has been in part facilitated by Moran’s acquisition of former Cavan manager Mickey Graham who, after spending five years with the Breffni men, agreed to come on board as his coach.
‘Mickey has been huge for us. Since Mickey came in we haven’t reinvented the wheel, we have done all of our training, our S&C, all that sort of stuff.
‘It is mainly on-field decisions. We knew that Longford were getting well beaten last weekend by Wexford. Mickey was there to lean on, is it the right thing to tell the boys at half-time that they were getting well beaten. Even a decision like that – he goes “absolutely, you have to” because he was in that position before.
‘To have that experience is huge, Mickey might have wanted a year or two out of being the head man, but he still loves being in there. He doesn’t have to deal with the stuff on the side — the County Board, all of that.
‘He still loves football. These little decisions, throughout the course of the League where he might have said things and it made me think for a second “yeah, that is the right way to go about it”. That is invaluable.
‘Id have that at work all of the time, so why not have that on the sideline when you have the opportunity to have it?’ added Moran, who remains consumed by the game.
‘What I always say is that to do it, you have to love it. It has to be a passion. You couldn’t do it if you’re half in or half out.
‘You have to be all in. Luckily for me I’ve a very supporting wife in Jennifer, she gives me all the latitude to go to do it. I love being involved in a team, being around a group, that helps it.
‘You need that love for it when you’re going through the bad days like we have done over the past two years at times,’ Moran added.