Cavan and Tipperary are growth stories in search of more chapters, but will it bring sustainable success?
THE view from Cloud Nine has been breathtakingly beautiful for Cavan and Tipperary football supporters all week. There’s a difference, of course. The whole of county Cavan – plus Breffni Blues scattered all over the world – united in euphoria and pride, whereas genuinely emotional support for Tipperary footballers tends to be regionalised.
There are large parts of the county where the footballers’ achievement in winning the Munster title for the first time in 85 years provided only limited consolation for the hurlers having their All-Ireland double ambitions zapped by Galway.
That, in some ways, made the football success all the more noteworthy. Hurling is – and always will be – No 1 in Tipperary. That has required the football clan to be exceptionally resilient, often in difficult circumstances.
Six years ago, Tipp’s football wing led the campaign to end the pampering of Kerry and Cork after the Munster Council decided that the draw would be framed so that they couldn’t meet until the final.
Players from the other four counties reacted by withdrawing from the 2014 McGrath Cup and declaring that they wouldn’t compete in the 2015 Munster Championship if the protected seeding arrangement for the
‘Big Two’ continued for more than one season.
The Munster Council relented, but the question persisted as to why, in a group of six, a system which blatantly discriminated against four was introduced.
The clear suspicion was that since football is weaker than hurling in Tipperary, Clare, Limerick and Waterford, the financial interests of a Cork-Kerry final trumped the promotion of football elsewhere. Where were the delegates from the lower-ranked four when the original decision was taken?
All of that may look irrelevant now as Tipperary savour their new-found status as Munster champions, but it underlines the difficulties lowerranked counties frequently experience. The Tipperary adventure continues next weekend when they head for Croke Park to pursue the dream of reaching the All-Ireland final. As for the Munster final, the odds are against them, but even if they lose to Mayo, 2020 will be a special year.
The same applies in Cavan, the comeback experts who stared down adversity so often over the last month. There was a lot more than courage in their performances in the four games, but its presence in such glorious abundance helped what became a relentless pursuit.
They are unlucky that the semifinal draw handed them Dublin, rather than Mayo or Tipperary, but defeat wouldn’t in any way dilute their Ulster Championship triumph.
Whatever happens next weekend, Cavan and Tipp will be oozing positivity heading into the 2021
campaigns.
That will bring its own challenges. Provincial wins by lower-ranked counties raise expectations locally, while also increasing alert levels elsewhere. Opposition in Division 3 will regard Cavan and Tipperary as special targets next season, and they will also be looked at differently in the provincial championships.
Coping with that will not be easy. That’s a long way from the thoughts of Mickey Graham and David Power right now, but it will become an issue quickly enough – and they will need to be ready for it.
So, too, will their county boards as they assess how to harness the potential upswing across all activities arising from last weekend.
Winning a provincial title – either after a long barren run or for the first time – should generate a hugely positive impact for the mid-tolonger-term future, but it hasn’t been the case in a few instances.
Cavan have first-hand experience of how things can turn sour quite quickly after a big year. In 1997, they were thrilled after winning the Ulster title for the first time in 28 years, believing that it was the start of really good times to come.
Their fans formed most of the 60,000-crowd for the AllIreland semi-final clash with Kerry. While Cavan lost, there was a giddy air around Croke Park that believed they would be back quite soon. Sixteen months later, Cavan were in turmoil after a player revolt forced out manager Liam Austin, who had replaced Martin McHugh. The momentum of 1997 was lost.
Clare ended a 65-year wait for the Munster title in 1992, when the John Maughan-coached team stunned Kerry in the final. It, too, created high hopes that rather than a one-off surprise, it was the start of something big. Clare did well in the subsequent league, reaching the semi-final, but it would be five years before they won their next Munster Championship game. And with no second chance, they were forced back into familiar territory behind Kerry and Cork.
In 1994, John O’Mahony steered Leitrim to their first Connacht success for 67 years in what certainly wasn’t a smash-and-grab raid. They beat the province’s three big beasts, Galway, Mayo and Roscommon, in a triple success which raised hopes of sustainable success over the following seasons.
It didn’t happen. Their only championship win over the next five seasons was against London.
Westmeath were similarly ambitious after winning the Leinster title for the first time in 2004, but that, too, turned out to be a onehit wonder as they won only two Leinster games over the next five seasons.
The unfortunate aftermath to those four provincial breakthroughs doesn’t make it inevitable that Cavan and Tipperary will struggle over the next few years. Far from it, as both have excellent squads and very good managers.
However, experiences from the past cannot be ignored. That applies as much to the county boards as to the players and managements.
Cavan and Tipperary have reached an important point.
For theirs – and football’s sake – it will hopefully be the start of a long journey, rather than something fleeting.