For all the toil, Mackey has managed to retain a belief
HAVING toiled in the cause of Cavan football for more than 14 years, Cian Mackey is approaching the twilight of his career. But there remains summits to scale — starting in Dr Hyde Park today when he hopes to help Mattie McGleenan’s team bounce straight back up to the topflight.
And Mackey believes that he can still win an Ulster medal even though he has yet to play in a provincial final. He looks across the county border to Monaghan and sees what can be achieved. There is no reason Cavan can’t harbour the same ambition as their neighbours.
It has been a good spring. Cavan’s fate comes down to their final two games, in Roscommon today and when they welcome Tipperary to Breffini Park next weekend — their two chief promotion rivals.
Last season was Cavan’s first in the top tier for 15 years. Mackey and his teammates had never experienced such rarefied air before and he reckons they spent a little too long admiring the scenery.
‘It took us a while to get going in Division 1,’ the skilful Cavan playmaker points out. ‘Our first game was against Dublin in Breffini. It doesn’t get much bigger. None of us had been in Division 1 before and we were enjoying the experience of playing Dublin and Kerry, when we should have been focused on getting points. Teams are much cuter up there and know how to win. It took us a while to realise that.
‘Look at how Monaghan keep surviving. They know how to get points on the board early and that makes it easier. And all those years up there has improved them as a team, and it is improving them as a county. They’re able to sustain it because they’re playing the best teams, week after week. Young players coming into the side are coming into an established Division 1 team.’
It’s difficult for a Cavan person to admit to admiration for their neighbours but Mackey feels they can learn a lot from how Monaghan have taken up residency in the top-flight, despite having the fourth smallest population in the country.
‘They show what can be done when you make the most of what you have. You can only sit back and admire what they have done. It is something to aspire to.’
Mackey insists Cavan aren’t that far away from their neighbours. As he points out, there was only a kick of the ball between the sides in the 2013 and 2015 Ulster semi-finals.
Both years, Monaghan used the slender win as a springboard to claim provincial honours. As a stylish attacker, Mackey didn’t fit the stereotype when Joe Brolly branded Cavan as football’s ‘black death’ on The Sunday Game a few years back for their ultra-defensive approach.
Mackey concedes that space was once at a premium but he’s noticed a shift towards attack in the past couple of years.
‘That’s clear, looking across the four divisions, teams are scoring more goals and more points,’ Mackey observes.
‘That comes from Dublin, from the top. Everyone sees how they play the game and they are taking their lead from that. Mattie wants everyone on our team to be confident of kicking scores and creating chances.
‘Last weekend in Breffini Park, ourselves and Down had an old-fashioned shoot-out.
‘There were plenty of goal chances for both teams, missed goal chances, but they were being created and that means excitement for the supporter. The way managers are approaching football has changed. It was always going to change.
‘Mattie wants us to play an attacking style. Players need to be able to kick scores. We had 11 different scorers against Cork, 10 against Down, so that’s a good sign.’
Since making his debut as a 17-year-old, Mackey has been a constant presence within the Cavan squad, apart from a brief period in 2012 when, as he recalls, ‘a few of us were considered surplus to requirements.’
As a self-employed plumber, he had to go to London in search of work a couple of years ago. He was coming home every weekend to play for his club, Castleharan, as they made their annual trip to the county final — they have lost the last three in a row.
‘There were a lot of late nights and early mornings,’ Mackey recalls. ‘It was something that wouldn’t have been sustainable if I wanted to play county football.’ Fortunately, work was sourced for him at home and he returned to his native Ballyjamesduff, a town that has changed from when Mackey was growing up.
‘A lot of Dubs have come down here to live,’ he explains.
That rising population may be something that benefits Cavan football in the future, but for the here and now, it is about Dr Hyde this afternoon and this team making the most of their chance to sup back at the top table.
And Mackey has been impressed by the number of youngsters that McGleenan has integrated into the team this year, with Bryan Magee, Oisin Kiernan and Caoimhin O’Reilly all staking a claim for a starting berth against Donegal in the Championship opener on May 13.
It will be Mackey’s 15th summer in the Breffini blue and, once again, he believes that this will be the year that he will reach an Ulster final.
If that belief wavers, he only to look across the border to Monaghan to know that Cavan aren’t that far away.