Dunning feels team is on ‘upward curve’ as Connacht final looms
EirGrid Connacht Under-20 Football Championship final preview
By Kevin Egan
Going into last week's Connacht U-20 football semi-final between Galway and Sligo, most observers would have found it hard to split the three sides that were still in the hunt for silverware at the time.
Galway had beaten Sligo in the group stages but only did so because Sligo missed a host of goal chances, while Roscommon had played both teams and drawn with both.
Whatever else people might have expected when the two sides renewed hostilities in Castlebar, Galway scoring 0-12 in the first 18 minutes wasn’t on too many bingo cards.
Like a firm ground horse that hadn’t raced since a couple of winter meetings at Tipperary or Gowran Park, but then was unleashed at the Punchestown Festival to pick up a big Grade One title, Derek Savage’s side looked transformed in what was essentially their first ‘hard ground’ game of this campaign.
Scoring 23 points in the space of an hour, with 11 players getting on the scoresheet, would suggest that this Galway side is about to come into their own.
The only thing about that, is that the same could be said of Roscommon, as the two sides prepare to do battle in the Connacht final this Saturday at Hastings Insurance MacHale Park, Castlebar (throw-in 5.15pm).
Three draws in their first three outings, with the Rossies the last team to equalize in all three instances, hinted at a side that was built around grit and resolve, rather than any abnormal level of attacking flair.
That was until their 3-16 to 2-6 win over Leitrim, a result which team manager Noel Dunning feels is also a testament to how his panel is built to thrive in faster, drier conditions.
“There was a steady upward curve since the Mayo game. Others mightn’t have seen it that way but we knew ourselves from watching the games and studying them back that we were improving – we just weren’t getting the weather to show it. Then we went to Ballinamore which was in excellent condition, and things fell into place,” said the St. Aidan’s club man.
While the scorelines were very different in those three draws, with Roscommon scoring 1-13 against Mayo and just 0-6 on a dismal night in Dr. Hyde Park against Galway, there were some common themes throughout, such as Roscommon falling behind but working their way back into the game, and strong contributions from the bench in each case.
Aside from the slow start against Mayo, Dunning expressed some regret that they left themselves in a situation where they needed Bobby Nugent to score that late 40-metre free in Markievicz Park, but he had identified from the start that this was an unusually deep panel for a small county at underage level, and that spreading around the playing minutes was always on the cards.
“You can never predict how a game is going to go, but knowing that you’re working with a talented panel is pointless if you’re not going to trust them to do a job for you when you need them. Players need to know that they’ll get a chance, and that they’ll be put in a position to be a game changer.
“There’s a serious volume of work gone into these guys, most of them over the course of the last two seasons. They’ve all bought into what we want to do, but if you’re not going to reward them or base your decisions on the work they’ve put in, they’ll ask why.
“It leaves us with some exceptionally difficult calls to make, but it’s working out too. Look at James Connolly, he was brought in totally from the cold to start at full back against Galway and he did well, even though he wasn’t on a (squad of) 24 before that.”
Of course, sharing around the minutes requires having enough playing time to allocate in the first place. In that regard, the switch to a round-robin championship has been a very welcome development. In 2023, Roscommon had a poor first half against a Sligo team that turned out to be exceptionally talented, and their championship was over before it began. It was a hammer blow to players but also to Dunning and his management team, and understandably, he has since become one of the strongest advocates of the new system.
“The winner takes all approach to what is supposed to be a development competition is very unfair. I said it to Andy Moran after the Leitrim game, they would have been gone after round one vs Galway. Look at the excitement, quality, drama from the round robin series, with all five counties still in contention going into the final round of games. People have been massively enthused and ordinarily you wouldn’t have got that,” he said.
“I would much rather that our work was judged over four games, rather than one. Some very good players have gone through the system playing two games in two years, this group is twice as many is one year.”
That defeat to Sligo, particularly at the time, when supporters weren’t aware of how good the “big dogs” were going to be, led to some disgruntlement among Rossies on the terraces. But even though there was huge disappointment at the outcome among the players and management, Dunning and his selectors went in with a two-year plan, and they were determined to stick with it.
“Last year I firmly believe that the two best teams in Connacht met in the first game between ourselves and Sligo. They were unlucky with injuries too, who would know what might have happened in the All-Ireland final if they had a full hand, so while we were disappointed obviously, we knew before a ball was kicked that Sligo was a very tough draw” he said.
“Regardless of that, we took a view that we needed to bring players on a two year cycle, and that’s why this year we’re bringing back 24 out of the panel of 38 from last year.
“There’s always expectation with supporters, you either live up to them or don’t, we didn’t and we were aware of that. It was another source of regret, but we were given a two-year term, we got full backing from the county board and they’ve been very good, there was never any question of them saying ye’ve tried and failed. They were fully behind us in 2023 and they are in 2024 as well”.
Some of the criticism stemmed from the fact that despite serving as a selector with Roscommon under Anthony Cunningham, Dunning wasn’t widely known across the whole county, having spent roughly two decades in London. Older fans will recall the heartstopping Connacht quarter-final that was the Rossies’ 0-12 to 1-8 win over the Exiles in 2005, his first championship game in the first of five years as London manager, and while he says that in terms of coaching and tactics, the sport of Gaelic football is barely recognisable, the managerial challenges are as relevant as ever.
“I’d go back to a comment I made as London manager at the time, which is that if you can manage an inter-county team in London, you’ll do it anywhere. The logistics involved, getting pitches, working with players to ensure that they can stay involved and get to training, these are all weekly tasks, and that doesn’t include different things like player eligibility and transfers, which is something that managers over here don’t really have to think about.
“Later on I was a selector with Ciarán Deely, I picked up a lot there from people he brought in from his professional soccer background, that experience is much closer to what we’re doing now with Roscommon U-20s. I believe you have to replicate the senior experience as best you can at U-20 level, because just the same as you want to bridge the gap in terms of football and physicality, we also have to help players to get ready for the culture involved with playing top level intercounty senior football”.
Dunning, whose youth was spent playing with Athlone in Westmeath before he transferred out to St. Aidan’s, didn’t have a coaching pathway identified when he returned to Ballyforan a few years ago, but he’s enjoying the journey all the same.
“The call from Anthony Cunningham was a bolt from blue, I had come back and just wanted to get involved with the club. I had no specific ambitions, we still have our business in London and I didn’t know what time I would have to spend in London. But when the call came I was delighted to get the opportunity, there was no way I could turn it down.
“I’m as primrose and blue as anyone, so you don’t say no to your home county. Even though we got promotion, overall the year didn’t work out as we had hoped, but I thoroughly enjoyed it and so I put my hat in the ring when the 20s job came up and I was delighted to get it.
“I’ve a very understanding wife, she’s looking after the business in London. I couldn’t do any of this without her – maybe the key to a successful marriage is to live in separate countries!”