WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN...
Ten years ago, before relentless Dublin pulled away from the f ield, Wexford very nearly caught them in the Leinster f inal
DUBLIN begin their march to an inevitable 11th provincial title in a row down in Wexford Park today. Nowhere in the world is there a sporting competition like the Leinster Football Championship where 10 games will be played over a month despite the outcome being obvious long before a ball is kicked. Everyone knows who the champions will be in 2021 – the same team that has won it for 15 of the past 16 years,
But there was a time when the Leinster Championship did not seem so pointless. It wasn’t all that long ago. In 2011, David Murphy captained a Wexford side who arrived in Croke Park believing they could beat Dublin and lift the Delaney Cup. And they almost managed it.
When Redmond Barry, the only player to put more than three Championship goals past Stephen Cluxton, raised a green flag in the 43rd minute of that year’s Leinster final, the shock was very much on. Wexford were on top in most sectors of the field. Graeme Molloy, as he usually did, was tying up Bernard Brogan and the talented Slaneyside attack was purring.
Think about that. Dublin trailing deep into the second half of a Leinster final in Croke Park. From where we are now, it doesn’t feel like a different time, but a parallel universe. But for an unfortunate mix-up between Molloy and goalkeeper Anthony Masterson that resulted in an own goal, Jason Ryan’s side might have held on for the county’s first provincial title in 66 years.
‘It seems strange to say where we are now, but we never had an inferiority complex when it came to Dublin in those years,’ Murphy remembered this week as the Model County side, now managed by his 2011 teammate Shane Roche, welcome the All-Ireland champions to Wexford Park.
‘We always went into those games, believing we could beat them. The year before, we had taken them to extra-time in the quarter-final in a game we probably should have won. The following year (2012), we had our chances to beat them in a semi-final too. We were confident of taking on anyone in Leinster, even Dublin.
‘But that final was definitely the one that got away. We had a couple of chances to go four up after Red’s goal, but then they got that fortuitous goal and then James McCarthy, who was in his first Championship season, scored a brilliant goal. Even after that, our heads didn’t drop and at the end we had a shot cleared off the line which would have drawn the match.’
DUBLIN were not the relentless killing machine they would become. There were still flaws, chinks in the armour which Pat Gilroy worked on throughout the summer. By the end of it, Cluxton’s nerveless free-kick into Hill 16 beat Kerry to claim the Sam Maguire and for the next decade, there has been an unprecedented era of dominance that few would have foreseen. Certainly not that day in Croker when Wexford headed home with a fistful of regrets.
Ten years on and Leinster senior football is a wasteland, any semblance of competition crushed by the big blue juggernaut. ‘It’s sad because if you look back, from when I started playing with Wexford, around 2001 or 2002 to 2012, there was a real competitive feel to Leinster. I know Dublin won it most years, but there were rarely any blow-outs and the finals were often tight matches, like in 2011.
‘You had Laois winning it, Westmeath winning it, we got to a couple of finals, Offaly got to a final. And teams genuinely believed they had a chance to beat Dublin. Nobody believes that any more, teams are beaten before they take the field in Croke Park. Even the likes of Kildare and Meath don’t believe they can challenge Dublin, so how could counties like Wexford and Carlow?’ Murphy asks.
‘I know everyone talks about the resources of Dublin, and the advantages they have, and that is a big part of it. But I think counties need to look at themselves too. The last few years, teams have been beaten before even going out in Croke Park. Our team always embraced the occasion when we went out there.’
It helped that they had the most talented Wexford side in generations, with an attack that was one of the best in the country and stacked with gifted forwards such as Barry, PJ Banville, Ciarán Lyng and Ben Brosnan, who happens to be one of the three survivors from 2011 on the side that beat Wicklow in Aughrim last weekend.
‘We had a wonderful set of forwards, as good as any in the country,’ Murphy points out. ‘A set of forwards like that probably only come along once in a lifetime in a county like Wexford. But with that sort of firepower, you were always going to fancy your chances.
‘And Ben is still there, plugging away like Daithí Watters in midfield. They have stuck with it through some tough times, and I know that winning last week in Aughrim meant as much to them as a Leinster title is going to mean to the Dublin players.’ Wexford claimed their first Leinster Under 21 title in 2011, which was considered a good sign for the future. But the football team is always going to be pushing a boulder uphill in a county that’s pre-dominantly hurling. Two of the best players on that U21 side – Liam Óg McGovern and Matthew O’Hanlon – were part of Davy Fitzgerald’s squad for yesterday’s Leinster hurling semi-final against Kilkenny.
The county slipped back in the past decade, despite trying bigname managers like Seamus ‘Banty’ McEnaney and Paul Galvin to revive fortunes. Now, they have gone back to one of their own in Roche – a vital cog in that team who came so close to beating Dublin in 2011 – to galvanise the players.
Roche isn’t the only member of that team playing his part. Murphy is U20 manager and his side had an impressive win over Carlow in their championship opener on Thursday night.
A small step, but in a county like Wexford they all count. Banville has been involved with development squads while Anthony Masterson is football development officer with the county board.
‘It’s always going to be hard in a county like Wexford, because you have hurling there and it is the primary game, but if we can start something at under-age level and build confidence, we can be competitive again,’ said Murphy.
Murphy and his 2011 team-mates will be able to tell the younger players that there was a time when footballers in the rest of Leinster didn’t fear Dublin. And met them as equals. It seems like ancient history now. And with each passing year, it may become harder and harder to believe.
Our team would always embrace the occasion of facing Dublin