Hard lessons have Wicklow primed for biggest test

By John Harrington

Like a sword put through fire, the Wicklow footballers have been hardened by adversity.

Their recent history has been pockmarked by a series of sore losses that would have broken the resolve of less mentally strong teams.

A last-gasp defeat to Kildare in the 2024 Leinster SFC quarter-final, a second-half collapse against Limerick in the 2025 Tailteann Cup semi-final, and an even worse one against Longford this year in the final round of the League are the three that stand out most.

They were 11 points ahead after 47 minutes of that League game against Longford and would have won promotion to Division 3 had they won it, so the mood in the dressing-room afterwards couldn’t have been any lower.

So much so that when team manager Oisín McConville drove down the road from Armagh for training on the following Tuesday he expected to field “a rally of phone-calls” from people saying they wouldn’t be able to make it.

Instead, his phone stayed silent, and when he got there every member of the playing panel, management, and backroom team was present to a man.

“That was our first step, that was the first part of the healing process,” says McConville when he reflects on what was a key milestone in the journey that has brought them to Saturday’s Tailteann Cup Final in Croke Park.

“We went out and did a good session and that's when you realise these boys do really want this.

“People always talk about where do you get the resilience from and unfortunately it's usually with tough times and we had a few tough defeats over the last couple of years.

“That definitely has helped us in regard to realising that we have the potential to challenge anybody and be up there with anybody but at the same time there's got to be a stage where glorious defeats or putting up a good show, that has to go, and we have to replace that with a winning mentality and that's the last piece of the jigsaw.

“It's great to be in a Tailteann Cup final but it's not worth a big pile unless we actually go and win it.”

If there were questions in the past about Wicklow’s mental strength in pressure situations, they’ve been answered by the manner in which they’ve reached Saturday’s Tailteann Cup Final.

They were nine-points down in the second-half of their quarter-final away to Antrim but kicked the last five points of the game to win by one.

They trailed Offaly by eight points at half-time in the semi-final, but then produced a stunning second-half display that saw them outscore the Faithful County by 1-17 to 1-4 to eventually win by five points.

McConville was pleased with the character his players showed in those two games, but thinks the narrative around that has overshadowed the quality of their play.

“When we won the quarter final in Antrim, the majority of what I read for the next couple of days was about their attitude and their heart and their desire and all those things,” he says.

“They are all key ingredients to winning matches but I felt as if people missed the quality with which we played. Not just the quality with which we played, but the way we went about it.

“That wasn't a gung-ho performance, we constructed the way we came back that day really well. We did the same thing the last day against Offaly.

“I'm not advocating we go 8 or 9 points down on Saturday because I don't think that's going to end well but the quality is there. If you can match the quality with all that heart and desire and all the things that are very obvious in this squad then we start to go places and we start to win things.”

If one player typifies that combination of character and quality that Wicklow have played with in recent weeks, it’s team captain Dean Healy.

The 34-year-old made his Garden County debut back in 2011, but he’s arguably playing the best football of his career.

In an otherwise very youthful panel, his experience, leadership, and all-round ability in the middle of the field makes him the beating heart of this Wicklow team.

“He’s so important because everything he does is designed towards going out on a Saturday or Sunday and putting in the performances he's put in,” says McConville.

“He doesn't get to his stage in life playing in county football by not looking after himself so he's a massive example for all the young lads but, moreover, he's such a quality player. His last four years since I've been there he's been phenomenal in terms of his consistency and everything else.

“Even in those four years I feel as if he's really developed. I think he was a great leader to begin with but he's developed into such an integral part of every single thing that Wicklow is about and the way he represents and everything else is just phenomenal.

“It's so important to have people like that in the changing room. We're lucky we have a few of them but he's a standard bearer for all that.”

There’s always been a great passion for Gaelic football in Wicklow, but it has often found its fullest expression in the club championships rather than in the enthusiasm with which the county team has been supported.

This Wicklow team though seems to have captured the hearts and minds of GAA people in the county, and a big and vocal crowd will descend on Croke Park to roar them on this Saturday.

“I probably only really got to see the passion in the last couple of years,” says McConville.

“There was a stage early on where it was quite lonely in Aughrim. They weren't coming through the turnstiles.

“But in the last two years there's been a great response because I think they see something in the team.

“That's not through me or through media or anything else. I think to be there and to watch them and to realise what they're giving, I think they've responded to that and the players have responded back by the same token. There's a massive want for success.

“There's a massive need for Wicklow playing at the highest level and competing in the biggest competitions and I think they feel as if now they have a group of players that they can really get behind. So the support and everything else has been brilliant and the passion that people have for it. Look, you can't be too harsh on supporters.

“You have to give them something to cheer. Probably in the last two years, semi-final last year, I know we've come up short, but being in the final this year, we've eventually given them something to cheer.

“The last piece of that jigsaw then is to actually win something. I see it's given everybody such a lift and a massive boost in confidence.”

Wicklow go into Saturday’s game as massive underdogs against a high quality Down team, and McConville knows his players have to produce the most complete performance of their careers to come out on top.

“We'll just have to play to levels that we have hit before but we'll have to play to them on a consistent basis,” he says.

“We're up against opposition of a level that we've probably only come up against once this year when we played Dublin. So we have to get to the pitch of it first and foremost.

“We are going to get opportunities. That's the thing, we are going to get opportunities in this game and we just have to take them. And if we do that, we're right in the game.

“To be honest, the three previous games we've had here, we've performed really well in them all. We've just haven't come with a 70-minute performance together yet, but we've always performed well in Croke Park.”