Cribbin eager for fresh start
Third time a charm for Lilies’ star
KEITH Cribbin is only 26 but he is entering the third phase of his Kildare career. It has taken him almost a year to recover from rupturing his cruciate ligament and tomorrow’s Leinster SFC semi-final against Westmeath has come just a little too early for the engaging Johnstownbridge native, but given everything he has endured in eight seasons as a county player, Cribbin has learnt the virtue of patience.
He had only turned 18 when Kieran McGeeney handed him a Championship debut in Kildare’s attack on what was a disastrous day for the Lilywhites when they were shocked by Mick O’Dwyer’s Wicklow in Leinster. A loss of form saw him drift off the panel and Cribbin saw a bit of the world, spending a year in Australia on a working holiday visa.
Within a few months of coming home, Cribbin had rediscovered the form that he had as a teenager and re-established himself as a key building block in Kildare re-asserting itself at football’s top table. However, last summer, he ruptured his cruciate ligament in a club game and he slipped off the radar again.
Kildare are one of those counties who seem particularly afflicted by the cruciate curse. There were plenty of team-mates, such as Peter Kelly and Mikey Conway, who could advise Cribbin on his rehabilitation. But there had been unforeseen complications. He developed tendonitis in his knee, which slowed the process down.
Given that he works in a leisure centre, which his family run in Newbridge, the athletic wing-forward had little excuse for carrying out his rehabilitation work on his knee. And he had targeted one of the final National League games for a return. But his body refused. ‘I got the operation exactly a year ago,’ Cribbin explains. ‘It took me 11 months to get back, a bit longer than normal, but I developed tendonitis in my knee during the recovery so that had to be controlled.’
His eagerness for another new beginning has chipped away at him. Five weeks ago, he sat in Croke Park and watched Kildare limp past Wexford and a few days later, lined out for Johnstownbridge in a club championship game. There was no reaction in his knee, but Lilywhites boss Cian O’Neill, with an extensive background in strength and conditioning, feels that playing Cribbin tomorrow is too great a risk.
When he recalls the more reflective moments on his lonely road back from the cruciate injury, Cribbin will accept that his manager is right to play it safe. Recovering from a cruciate injury takes a mental toll, as well as a physical one. After going under the knife, Cribbin headed off to the Canaries. ‘I needed to clear my head, so I went to Lanzarote for two weeks.’ While there, he watched his team-mates record a resounding victory over Cork. Arriving home, he felt that the squad was flying.
Instead, the Lilywhites were wiped from the field by Kerry in the AllIreland quarter-final, conceding seven goals in the process. Observing that game from the stands was particularly painful for Cribbin.
‘Coming home from Lanzarote, there was a great vibe around the place and then we ran into Kerry and everyone knows what happened there,’ Cribbin states plainly. ‘It was a bit of a low point, but we can’t dwell on it. We have to look forward. If we keep dwelling on conceding those goals, we won’t progress.’
However, there was a blood-letting session with O’Neill about the defensive frailties that resulted in the deluge of those goals in Croke Park.
‘There was definitely discussion about it. We had to open it up and see why exactly we conceded seven goals, and where we were conceding them. We talked about it at length but we have to move on from it.’
Cribbin admits that it was a concern that he wasn’t one of the 35 players which O’Neill managed to have a look at during a Division 3 campaign that saw them promoted. ‘I would have preferred to come back a little earlier and got some game-time during the League.
‘But it is an exciting time to be coming back into the squad. There’s a chance to get to a Leinster final and Kildare don’t get there that often. Westmeath have momentum on their side. They will be full of confidence and see us as a team with no momentum, having to wait so long between games.’
Still, the expectation is that Kildare will be in their first Leinster final since 2009 by tomorrow evening — the perfect environment for Keith Cribbin’s new beginning as a Lilywhite.