Fáilte chuig gaa.ie - suíomh oifigiúil CLG

Football

football

Mark Poland hopes Down have turned the tide

Mark Poland

Mark Poland

By John Harrington

Down reaching this year’s Ulster SFC Final looked like a dim and distant prospect back in February.

A six-point defeat away to Clare in the Allianz Football League saw the team hit rock bottom.

It was their 14th straight defeat in League and Championship football and it prompted critics both within and outside the county to come for the team with sharpened blades.

Humble pie has since been served all round, but the memory of the criticism is still fresh in the mind of Mark Poland.

The Mourne County veteran put his head above the parapet at the time to defend the team and isn’t inclined just yet to forgive and forget.

“I was actually asked to go on to a radio podcast thing myself and I just felt that I needed to get a few things out there because we were being kicked from pillar to post,” he said.

“Now, if you don’t win a game in however months you are going to get that, but some of the stuff I thought went a bit too far. People writing article in papers and dragging the Down jersey through the gutter in our eyes.

“It probably still doesn’t sit easy with me to be honest with you. But, that’s what it is. The boys took motivation. Maybe some of the older player looked into it and spoke about it a wee bit. They didn't’ like it.

“But then again, what could we turn around and say then, we hadn't won a game in how many competitive matches, do you just have to be thick skinned sometimes and get on with it, but it really was - every day there was something in the paper about Down and it wasn’t something good.

“At the end of the day we are all amateur sportsmen. We don’t go out to make mistake. It’s probably Down’s tradition the reason why it’s so spoken about.

“Hopefully those championship wins have maybe turned the tide and the big thing to me is that it’s going to inspire a new generation hopefully too, with the amount of children and that there who are probably seeing what’s going on this past while.

“To me, at my stage of my career, that’s every bit as enjoyable, as to maybe winning matches. Now we’ve got to a final, we want to go one further.”

Mark Poland

Mark Poland

It’s a testament to Poland’s commitment to the Mourne County cause that he came back for more this year despite the team’s failure to win a single League or Championship match in 2016.

At the age of 32 with 12 championship campaigns under his belt and a new-born baby in the house, it wasn’t as if he didn’t have enough excuses to hang up the boots, but deep down he knew he still had more to give.

“I think it comes a time again when you get Christmas and that over you, there’s an itch, well in me anyway,” he says.

“When you play for so long and you dream of wearing the jersey when you are a child and you just don’t want to walk away on them terms. I’ve said it all along, People would know that I’ve said it, last year wasn’t a true reflection of Down football and maybe this past couple of year hasn’t been.

“I didn’t want to walk away from younger player coming in. That would have been the easiest thing in the world to do.

“Now there was times this year when you sort of would be doubting yourself.

“Maybe wondering why did you come back. That’s not paid off yet, but with the two championship wins it’s certainly been worthwhile.”

Mark Poland

Mark Poland

Poland has had to make do with a substitute’s role thus far in Down’s Championship campaign, but he’s happy to fulfil whatever role he’s required to for the good of the collective. 

“To be honest with you my own form is good,” he says. “I know from coming into matches I am going well in training and that there. Just the boys that started, they’ve got them jerseys.

“They played the league and in fairness Eamon has stuck by them and there’s a lot of young lads in there and a lot of pace in the team.

“Eamon has told me I’m battling for the number 11 jersey with Conor Maginn and that’s no mean feat to maybe be waiting in the wings on that man there, because to me over the past five, six, seven years probably one of the most underrated footballers in Ulster.

“You see his first two performance sin Ulster have been top notch. To be honest with you if Down win an Ulster title and that means me sitting the bench for the whole game, then so be it.”