Cian OSullivan
By John Harrington
Cian O’Sullivan believes Dublin have plenty of room for improvement after their Leinster Semi-Final victory over Meath. The reigning All-Ireland Champions won by a very comfortable 10-point margin, but O’Sullivan was not happy with their second-half performance.
“I suppose the first-half was quite a good half of football I'd say from a spectators' perspective,” he said. “It was a close game. I felt the intensity out there. In the second-half the game just seemed to go down a couple of paces, quite a flat performance from probably both sets of teams.
“From our perspective we’d be unhappy with aspects of the second half. We got a performance against Meath so on balance, we’re very happy with how we’re doing. That’s all we can do, build on that performance the next day. Hopefully if we win, we’re into an All-Ireland quarter-final. It’s scary how fast this season is going. It feels like we’re coming out of pre-season yet we’re into a Leinster final already.”
Meath did their best to contain Dublin by playing a cautious, defensive brand of football. It was a far cry from the days when contests between the teams were over and back battles of equals, but O’Sullivan does not think the heat has gone out of the rivalry forever.
“That rivalry will reignite over years,” he said. “I know at underage level we enjoyed some very good battles with Meath and we had some strong battles with Meath over the last couple of years. The likes of Cillian O'Sullivan making the step up and coming through and I have no doubt in the next couple of years that they'll be a force to be reckoned with and that we'll have some of those epic battles. We're close neighbours and with that always comes that rivalry and that extra bit of spice to games. That'll always be there.”
There was nothing surprising about Dublin’s win over Meath, and everyone expects them to have little trouble dispatching Westmeath and claiming a sixth Leinster title on the trot and 11th in 12 years. They have become an utterly dominant force in their own province, but O’Sullivan insists it would be foolish for them to ever become complacent.
“It's funny how these things ebb and flow,” he said. “Teams go through patches of good and bad times. I remember my first year playing on the Dublin team. We got to an All-Ireland quarter-final against Kerry and I can't remember the last time we were in a semi-final before that. A massive deal as it always is, got beaten by Kerry by 17 points.
“That was 2009. Two years later we were lifting Sam in 2011. In such a short space of time things changed and it's something we're very conscious of in the Dublin team, that sport is very fickle. There's no guarantees and you could be on top of the hill, the king of the hill one week, and the next week the whole thing could fall asunder.”
