‘Saviours of football’ spring the perfect trap
Robbie Dolan feels the effects of a tireless display and is congratulated by team selector Enda Nugent following St. Brigid's success against Corofin. Pictures: INPHO/James Crombie
When it comes to seizing the moment, no one does it better than St. Brigid’s.
Anyone still trying to figure out what the club’s maiden All-Ireland senior football title ten years ago did for the mindset of young players that dream big around the parish of Kiltoom and Cam were finally able to draw their conclusions as a pulsating Connacht club decider reached a crescendo at a bitterly cold Dr. Hyde Park on Sunday afternoon.
Brigid’s had repelled everything Corofin had thrown at them and now, here they were confirming that they had delivered on the day that mattered most. The games against Coolera-Strandhill and Mohill were smokescreens. The explosion of talent and pace within this fearless young team had turned the cool, crisp air green and red. Ruaidhrí Fallon and Ciarán Sugrue stroked over points as if they were having a kickabout in Kiltoom to leave no one in any doubt that the Shane McGettigan Cup was coming back to Kiltoom for the first time since 2012.
On that occasion, in the MacHale Park fog against Ballaghaderreen, a dominant performance delivered a hat-trick of provincial crowns. It was a Brigid’s team at the peak of their powers, and it ended up being the precursor to what eventually became the greatest day in the club’s history the following St. Patrick’s Day.
On Sunday last, with pretty much a new team, Brigid’s were streets ahead of a Corofin side that were supposedly enjoying a renaissance after a couple of years out of the limelight. They were being labelled as the pretenders to Kilmacud Crokes’ crown. But Brigid’s ruthlessly ripped up that script. The ease at which they managed it opens up a myriad of opportunities over the coming years.
This team have never bought into the mantra that “you have to lose one to win one”. In 2020, players like Ciarán Sugrue, Brian Derwin, Ben O’Carroll and Ruaidhrí Fallon illuminated the Roscommon senior football championship as that youthful exuberance swept aside all before them. Covid denied them the chance to test themselves on the provincial stage that season, but it hasn’t taken them long to adjust to becoming central protagonists at this time of year.
Teams have set up defensively against them, while other teams have chanced their arm in the hope of turning games into a shootout. But Brigid’s have met every challenge with a refreshing mindset.
Jerome Stack has backed and believed in the talent available to him, and on Sunday that trust reaped a huge reward as his team produced the ultimate team performance spearheaded by players that the manager needed, but would have expected, to perform.
Ben O’Carroll was magnificent. He ended up with a personal tally of 1-7 and terrorised one of Galway’s most highly regarded defenders, Liam Silke, in the process. His unselfishness off the ball was just as pivotal as he made runs to open up the space for other players — a natural talent in full bloom, but all in the name of the collective.
At the other end of the field, Brian Stack was a colossus. In the knowledge, just like Roscommon, that Brigid’s have a fireman to quench the opposition’s main threat represents incredible reassurance for any team to have in their locker. Veteran Gary Sice was having a stellar season for Corofin and had been instrumental in his side’s reputed rebirth. But Stack negated his influence, so much so that Sice missed two frees that he would normally convert with his eyes closed in the second half.
With the main actors taking centre stage, the supporting cast followed, with Ruaidhrí Fallon and Eddie Nolan delivering big performances. Pearse Frost was magnificent during the opening half, while Robbie Dolan paid the ultimate tribute to his late uncle Tommy (Dolan) by putting in an incredible shift for the team.
As the game progressed, snapshots appeared to showcase St. Brigid’s dominance. A spectacular fetch from Ruaidhrí Fallon, Brian Stack’s shuddering shoulder that put Brian Cogger on his backside, Robbie Dolan’s interception that ignited a move that procured a score for Ben O’Carroll — all that in the opening 30 minutes alone.
Corofin were on the canvass, but Liam Silke’s goal on the cusp of half time gave them hope. As expected, they threw everything they had at St. Brigid’s in the opening ten minutes of the second half. Three wides suggested that the Roscommon champions had weathered the storm, but when Dylan McHugh found the net in the 39th minute to reduce St. Brigid’s arrears to just a point, the expectation that Corofin would find a way to win gathered momentum.
In truth, those two Corofin goals masked a distinctive gulf in class between the sides. Brigid’s came again, and it was no surprise that O’Carroll and Stack showed the leadership required to land two exquisite points from play to put their team back in the driving seat.
Corofin hardly laid a glove on Brigid’s in the final quarter, and that double-whammy from Fallon and Sugure inside a minute to push their side six points clear showcased a side that has the world at their feet this week.
How long it takes them to scale to the summit of the mountain under the glare of the national spotlight remains to be seen. But Brigid’s have everything going for them — a young age profile, enough players with big-game experience and the temperament required to compete with the best at this level, and of course, they have a natural talent that allows the players to express themselves.
Joe Brolly was right. The “saviours of football” were in Dr. Hyde Park on Sunday last. They just happened to be wearing green and red jerseys.
