Down brickie O'Hagan is as solid as a rock
Darran O Hagan
By John Harrington
Down captain Darren O’Hagan is a hard worker both on and off the pitch.
A bricklayer by trade, as a hobby he also works on the family farm a few days a week looking after their herd of cattle.
A life of physical labour means getting his hands dirty on a football pitch is second nature to him.
A corner-back’s role is usually the least glamorous on the pitch, but O’Hagan plays like someone who relishes getting stuck in and making life mystery for opposition star forwards.
One of the reasons that Down are in Sunday’s Ulster SFC Final is because they played with a controlled, but still ferocious aggression in their two wins over Armagh and Monaghan.
O’Hagan very much set the tone with his own displays in that regard, and isn’t the sort to apologise about it.
“We play the game as it is played, it's physical and hitting hard,” he says.
“It's the way Down used to play football, they were physical and in teams' faces. They hit hard and they play football.
“I didn't think we were too bad against Monaghan. Monaghan probably hit us as hard as we hit them. It's probably something that has been lacking in Down this last couple of years, a bit of physicality.
“I think we brought that to the table, the last day against Armagh as well. It helps the team. Maybe a good hit or a good tackle is as good as a score at the other end.
“I suppose the likes of Niall McParland, Peter Turley, Niall Donnelly, they are big physical lads and that's the way they play football.
“We have those size of lads around the middle area and they won the tackle count. They aren't playing dirty, it's just the way they play football.”
Darran O'Hagan
O’Hagan is happy people are now starting to view Down as a physical side, because in recent years they’ve had a reputation for being nice footballers, but something of a soft touch.
“Yeah, it probably would be,” he says. “Everybody knows Down for their football and not their physicality. We are still nowhere near the most physical team in Ireland.
“It has helped us over the last two games when we have upped it, but if you look at Tyrone, their physicality is far stronger than us. They are way down the road on that from us."
Playing a direct brand of football worked well against both Armagh and Monaghan, but it against a Tyrone team with the imposing figure of Colm Cavanagh sweeping in defence, it may not be as successful a ploy.
O’Hagan believes Down can find a way to break the Tyrone machine, but is more than happy to confer them with the title of hot-favourites going into the match.
“In Down, we will look at Tyrone as much as they will look at us,” he says.
“There may be a couple of weaknesses, there mightn't be too many but we will see where we can get scores how we can.
“Tyrone play a system, they are probably the best in the country at the moment playing their system so they are going to be very hard to break down.
“They are probably a couple of more years down the line from Monaghan. They have more experienced players all over the field.
“Tyrone will definitely not underestimate us. They will be going in as hot favourites and rightly so. They are among the top two or three teams in Ireland. Hot favourites and deservedly so.”
