'It’s the defeats that I remember more than the wins'
Remarkably, when Garrycastle won the first of their eight Flanagan Cup titles all of 20 years ago back in 2001, the green and red-clad side featured a youthful Doron Harte, and the versatile former Westmeath player is now on the verge of a ninth Westmeath senior football championship medal after his side’s five-point win against The Downs last Sunday in TEG Cusack Park.
In the aftermath of last Sunday's game, Harte stated: “I was struggling at the start of the year with a bad injury I got against St Loman’s in the league, and when you are a bit older it takes that bit longer to recover. Gary (Dolan) has been looking after me fairly well! I’m delighted to get the win. At the end of the day, semi-finals are all about winning. We went out in the quarter-final last year against The Downs and it niggled away at us all winter. It was a game we left behind us as we kicked 19 wides in it. We were certainly not going to do that today.”
Garrycastle got off to a blistering start which yielded two goals in as many minutes, and this greatly pleased Harte. “They were two great goals. We worked the ball quickly with accurate passing. Earlier in the year, we were starting games a bit slowly, and that was another area we tried to work on. Similarly, the 1-2 at the start of the second half gave us a platform to go on and win the game."
"Maybe we sat off a bit, but even when we conceded those couple of goals we still had a bit of a cushion. They didn’t exactly carve us open but, at the same time, they were sloppy goals to give away. Our energy levels had dropped off a bit. If we concede goal like that in the final, we probably won’t be coming out on top. But we never panicked,” he continued.
“It’s my 21st year playing senior football and I’ll be going for my ninth title. I’ll be absolutely delighted if we can get that cup. Cathal Mannion getting sent off was a bit of a blow, as he has been going very well in training. I’m not sure if there is anything we can do about the red card. We’ll have to wait and see. He’d be a huge loss.”
Garrycastle will meet St Loman’s, Mullingar in the final after the defending champions defeated Coralstown/Kinnegad in the other semi-final.
“It’s the defeats that I remember more than the wins, even though I have won eight finals. That’ll be driving me on over the next two weeks,” added Harte.
Meanwhile, St Loman’s Mullingar manager Declan Kelly was understandably a relieved man last Sunday afternoon after the champions had been pushed all the way by underdogs Coralstown/Kinnegad before the Mullingar men qualified for yet another Flanagan Cup decider.
Kelly felt that their four-point winning margin was flattering, saying: “With ten minutes to go, it wasn’t looking good. We plugged it back and got level, and the goal (from Fola Ayorinde) at the end put a bit of daylight between us, but I wouldn’t say there was four points between us to be honest over the course of the game.”
The Offaly man was delighted with his charges’ start, a great goal by Peter Foy after a mere 35 seconds. “Yes, our starts have been an issue for us recently, but we got the goal and a couple of points to back it up. We had a good first quarter but Coralstown/Kinnegad dominated the second quarter, and in the second half they were pretty dominant again. We just the few scores to get us back into it, but it was a tight game,” he stated.
The bainisteoir was asked about the positive impact of his subs, and replied: “Yeah, we’ve been asked about some lads who’re not starting, but it’s a panel game and we have fellows who can give you an impact when they come on. In fairness, the few lads who came on made a difference. They were fresh legs on a pitch that was cutting up a bit. With 65 minutes being played, you are going to need a bit of something to come off the bench.
“Also, in these situations you need your players to step up, and John (Heslin) came out and won a couple of kick-outs for us and we got our hands on the ball again. Then Ronan (O’Toole) kicked a couple of points to get us back into the game. You need your big players to perform,” he added.
When he was asked to look ahead briefly to the county final showdown with old rivals Garrycastle, Kelly responded: “They’re well used to each other. There’s a lot of experience in both camps. I saw some of the first game (when they beat The Downs) and when they get ahead of you, they know how to close out games. It’ll be an interesting battle! You’d be hoping that Paddy Dowdall and Paul Whelehan will be back in the mix by then.”
- Gerry Buckley