OVER THE PAST fortnight, the Galway football faithful have been clearly excited about a Connacht final in their own backyard. Four years is far from a famine for this mercurial county. Their previous drought was double.
Nonetheless, throughout this spell, they could and did find comfort in the fact that they weren’t even close. Skim through the exhaustive examination of this lull and you won’t miss vague rationalizations, from weak structures to rigid philosophies.
After 2008, they appeared in one of the next six provincial makers. Players and coaches were sucked in and spat out. Sometimes it was a mess.
This is no longer the case. Past and current managers are all-Ireland winning legends with a formulated and well-organized setup. This current generation of players have appeared in the last five Connacht finals, but they have only won one.
To some extent, they perform. Losing on Sunday and the collective will have to accept the fact that now they have no more excuses. Are they good enough? It’s time to find out.
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Much of their perspective rests on Sean Kelly’s broad shoulders and the area he’s about to command. The Moycullen native transitioned smoothly from a middle-tier work house to a house sitter.
He scored in five of seven league games on their run to the last four in 2018. This season he has kept Jason Doherty and Shane Moran scoreless at full-back.
The analysis of Padraic Joyce’s Galway Bar Stools is that they are top notch in the front, flimsy in the back. Kelly is tasked with solving this problem. Joyce named the 24-year-old team captain earlier this season. When injured in the Connacht final last year, Galway collapsed. He is their leader.
Has he always seemed material captain?
“No”, admits Gareth Bradshaw. He gave 14 years of service to Galway and hails from the same club as Kelly.
“It’s being honest. He speaks on the pitch. If you give Sean Kelly a shirt you know exactly what you’re going to get. Actions more than words but that’s what they need now. I think he’s a brilliant captain for Galway.
“Sean was always going to be a full-back. I sincerely mean it. Even thinking back to the league final, it got around him when he was in midfield. He wasn’t really attacking or defending.
“Galway needs him there and he’s made for it. He’s also a springboard for attacking as well as negating danger. That’s his position. Fingers crossed he’s doing well and bringing home a Connacht Cup in Moycullen.
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When Kevin Walsh made his Galway debut in 1987, the late Padraig ‘Dandy’ Kelly was a leader in the team. 30 years later, Walsh was manager and invited Kelly’s son to join the senior team.
Padraig was one of Galway’s long-serving players in the 1980s, and he sadly passed away in November 2001. He was a popular teacher and dedicated clubman, serving as player and secretary.
“Dandy was a legend,” recalls Henry Lydon. He played and coached at Moycullen for years. His brother, Mark, was a doubles player for Galway.
“He used to drag me up and down the pitch. I went to UCD growing up and it would have had a big influence on me. He was constantly talking, be sure to be with these boys and learn. You could always count on him to get a crucial score or sway a referee, truth be told.
“Sean runs like him. Thrown arms, unorthodox stride. If you saw a guy running like that, you’d think, “I can handle that guy no problem. There must not be a lot of football. The next thing he’ll pass you!”
On Wednesday evening, Lydon was transporting cattle when one of his three sons rushed towards him. ‘Sean Kelly has been there. He waved and stopped to say hello! He suddenly realized how influential inter-county players were to local youngsters and how well Kelly was suited to his role as Games Development Officer, running training sessions at local schools and clubs.
The three brothers Kelly and Moycullen form a tribe. This is where they were bred and brought up. When the local nursery was blocked for help after Covid, she turned to Sean. He had frequented it as a child and knew its importance. Kelly and her brother, Eoghan, went to work. Always answer the call.
They played anything and everything. Sean was a talented minor football player for Salthill. All three were distance runners in school and superb basketball players. Paul played underage for Ireland.
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Eoghan coached Moycullen to the 2016 National Cup final and then traveled to Connecticut on a basketball scholarship. He then accepted a scholarship offer from a D3 school in Chicago.
He returned in 2020 and immediately got to work. At first, he joined the club’s junior football team. An unquestionably elite athlete but someone who missed out on three years of football development.
Alongside his brothers and their friend, Galway vice-captain Matthew Tierney, he trained religiously and broke into the club’s senior team that year.
When Moycullen won his first-ever county final of 2020, Eoghan came on as a substitute. Now he is a mainstay. Last March, the three brothers started for NUIG in their final Sigerson Cup triumph. Eoghan was tasked with suppressing David Clifford. He excelled. In recent weeks he has been invited to the Galway squad alongside his two brothers.
Sean is admired within the band for his tendency to carry on quietly and diligently. Its captain is focused on hard work and leading by example.
The win over Mayo was a poignant match for the brothers as they lined up a day after their grandmother died. Mary Bridget Kelly was a strong supporter of Moycullen and Galway for decades. Padraig was his only son.
“They are a credit to their father,” says Seamus Friel. He was a goalkeeper on that County Championship-winning side, coming out of retirement so he could play with his three cousins Kelly.
“All three. They had a natural ability with the sport in general and there’s no doubt where they got it from.
“But with that natural ability, they take it very seriously. They train hard and eat well. They are so tight and their mother takes good care of them. The three boys are home for dinner at six o’clock. No questions. The best-fed men in the country.
“Over the past two years, Sean has put on some big muscles. I wonder if he grew too fast. That might have contributed to some of those injuries he had. Maio last year. He got injured against Kerry in a championship match a few years ago. Too much stress on his body while he was still developing, but he’s where he wants to be now.
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For a long time, Gareth Bradshaw was the West Galway club’s sole representative on the county panel. Defender David Wynne then entered the fray. In recent years, a trickle has become a flood. In addition to the Kellys, Owen Gallagher, Dessie Connelly and James McLaughlin are also involved. Peter Cooke was a good performer until he took a break this year.
“Bradshaw was a devotee. He was the representative of our club, ”explains Lydon.
“Now you check every county team at different levels, there are Moycullen players dotted there. We had more success. Michael Donnellan became a coach. The 2020 win was massive.
“It’s partly because there are also fewer guys who play duels. In my time there were several who played both. You might have a low number of practices because it was a week of hurling or football. Now there is none. When we won the intermediate hurling in 2011, in my eyes what helped us win was that we were knocked out of football early.
“We had Paul Clancy with Galway obviously who won two All-Irelands, then Gareth. A little dusted miner. Mark was there a few years. Then it plummeted until now where it exploded.
In 2020, Bradshaw and David Wynne took the same game plan that Kevin Walsh poured into Galway and brought it into the club. It turned out to be a powerful recipe and they thrived. It put an overabundance aside in the showcase. Of the 26 nominated for Sunday, four are from Moycullen.
“I would be lying if I said it was all down to huge structural improvements,” says Bradshaw.
“It’s a talented culture. They’re all great young guys and they’re pushing us, but the next few years will really tell where we are. Corofin is the benchmark and we all aspire to reach this level.
The key is to maximize every bit of their divine talent. Bradshaw went to St Mary’s Secondary School. There he was exposed to the coaching of future Galway boss Liam Sammon. This is the lesson he now hopes to instill in the club. A lesson that the county can take into account.
“It’s either in you or it’s not. I saw a lot of good club players at Moycullen who could have played at a higher level and they didn’t fulfill their potential. You really have to lower the tools and be totally selfish and selfless. Carry on with that.
“The same with Galway. Sunday is a big game for them. I think they will really want to go and put a marker after Roscommon turned them around at Pearse Stadium in the last two finals. The expectation is there now. The Galway crowd expects them to win it after knocking out Mayo.
“That expectation is probably new for the young guys Padraic has given playing time to this year. But that’s what has to happen. More chatter. Go do the work.
The Kelly method.
