Desperate Down ‘lack a winning mentality’
CLUB footballer of the year Eugene Branagan has accused Down players of ‘not having a winning mentality’ and said manager James McCartan has been thrown ‘under the bus’. Branagan says the majority of his Kilcoo team-mates do not want to play for the county. Just two players from Kilcoo’s All-Ireland winning team — goalkeeper Niall Kane and Ryan McEvoy — featured in Down’s 10-point defeat by Monaghan last weekend that sent the Mourne men tumbling into the Tailteann Cup. Branagan, speaking at a reception in Croke Park where he picked up his award as AIB club footballer of the year yesterday, was one of a number of Kilcoo players who declined an invite to join the county panel this year. ‘I just have honestly no ambition to play for Down and I don’t mind saying that,’ he said. ‘I think there’s a core of players, who don’t know how to win. They haven’t the winning mentality. ‘I think that’s why a lot of Kilcoo boys don’t want to be involved — they’re just there but I don’t think they’re there to win. That’s the difference between Kilcoo and the county. ‘A few years ago, there were
From Back Page more playing but these past few years there’s boys coming back and we feel they would be in a better place if they were training with us. Branagan also claimed that Down boss McCartan had been thrown ‘under the bus’ by his players.
McCartan had to be talked out of quitting just weeks before the start of the Championship after it emerged some Down players broke a drinking ban while on a training weekend in Dublin. ‘He was sort of thrown under the bus, they had got nobody to take the job and he took it. ‘Breaking drink bans and it only two weeks before a game, that’s not going to win anything. I actually felt sorry for him the way the whole thing has panned out,’ said Branagan, who identified clubmate and the Down Under-20 boss Conor
Laverty as a potential county manager.
AIB CLUB FOOTBALL TEAM OF THE YEAR: N Kane (Kilcoo); S Ryan (St Finbarr’s), R McEvoy (Kilcoo), D O’Brien (K Crokes); M Rooney (Kilcoo), R O’Carroll (K Crokes), D Branagan (Kilcoo); C Dias (K Crokes), N Daly (P Pearses); C Doherty (Kilcoo), J Johnston (Kilcoo), E Branagan (Kilcoo); D Mullin (K Crokes), S Sherlock (St Finbarr’s), P Carey (P Pearses).
AIB HURLING CLUB TEAM OF YEAR: S O’Keeffe (Ballygunner); I Kenny (Ballygunner), J Holden (Ballyhale Shamrocks), F Burke (St Thomas); P Mahony (Ballygunner), R Reid (Ballyhale), D Corcoran (Ballyhale); C O’Doherty (Slaughtneil), P Leavey (Ballygunner); M Mahony (Ballygunner), TJ Reid (Ballyhale), Billy O’Keeffe (Ballygunner); D Hutchinson (Ballygunner), B Rogers (Slaughtneil), E Cody (Ballyhale).