Even in this day and age, there are people who, unless and until they are affected by it themselves or you metaphorically lamp them with a sledge hammer, will still try to convince you mental health “Isn’t real”.
Yes, I have been accosted by the “If it upsets you just don’t think about it” twaddle. Oh that it were that easy. The thing about such ailments is, the more you try not to think about something, the more it infests your mind. Now, thankfully, yours truly has been on a decent enough run with regard to life with the black cloud hovering.
However, one of the myriad unseen side effects of having to engage in such battles is when what for most would only be a mundane physical ailment gets in on the head. Highly regrettably from a perspective, the weekend just passed being a sickening case in point. When a supposedly routine head cold/chill ended up leaving this writer even more incapacitated than usual!
A scenario which not only left me absolutely crestfallen at missing Dunboyne’s local derby SFC semi final against our neighbours and great rivals Dunshaughlin, but gave the conspiracy theorists a banquet on which to gorge of “He’s only not here because it’s Dunshaughlin” kind. I’m so used to it now it generally runs off me like water off a duck’s back. But the dung spreaders had an even larger pit of material with which to work due to the fact that my best friend and greatest inspiration David Gallagher is presently an integral part of Richie Kealy’s backroom team with the three time Keegan Cup winners. Which led to a very strange Saturday indeed for many of us. Not least the big fella himself.
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Mind you, in terms of the nuts and bolts of the match, Dunboyne played as well as they have done in many a day. If you’d said before the game that Ger Robinson’s side would, by and large, nullify the threat of Conor Gray, Luke Mitchell and Mat Costello, consensus would surely have been that the 2018 winners would have been a decent percentage of the way towards victory.
Which they were. Yet they can blame nobody for their demise but themselves. Yes, they could, with legitimacy point to a few very questionable calls from the whistler which went against them, but every team has to deal with that.
Certainly, a Dunshaughlin defender was very fortunate not to get at least a black card for a shuddering hit on Mark Furlong and then when – for reasons best known to himself – David Gough brought an injury time free for a foul on Ciaran McCarrick by Dunboyne sub Cian Smith, it’s my honest opinion that the highly decorated Slane clubman must have thought he was working with the incoming experimental rules, because he absolutely brought the ball considerably further than 13 metres, all but giving the hitherto anonymous Mitchell a gift wrapped score.
However, when you kick more than twice the amount of errant shots as your opponents, the reason for the travails you find yourself in lie only in the mirror.
That said, personal heartbreak at the flagship part of our season’s journey being over was, inwardly at least, tempered by knowing how much it meant to the victors. Not only because this is only their second campaign back at the top table of Meath football. Or even because of the sheer ocean of talent flowing through every line of their team.
Mostly perhaps, due to the possibly indescribable motivation coming from within. Maybe as a means of dealing with – or at least trying to process the unspeakable grief visited upon the Dunshaughlin club, community and much further afield with the untimely deaths of Maria and Denis Kealy within months of each other.
In the immediate of the gut wrenching defeat, my greatest conundrum was what to queue up on Spotify: The Saw Doctors (To Win Just Once), ABBA (The Winner Takes It All) or Buddy Holly (I Guess It Doesn’t Matter Anymore) to sum up how crestfallen the feeling was to be out of the running for the Keegan Cup yet again.
Indeed, a soul might even be tempted to ask what’s another year. But then, it could be that the greatest learnings out of recent happenings is to trust one’s own judgement a little bit more readily.
For it appears – as I am fully sure of myself – that the one seeing eye here is still very much in tune and up to speed with the state of play on the local scene. Even if, to my utmost and unending heartache, certain people in certain places will never appreciate or understand that. Or indeed acknowledge how upsetting that is for the occupant of this seat.
Anyway, moving on, notwitstanding the obligatory annual €10 on Dunboyne regardless of what our odds are, the few predictions posted here earlier in the year didn’t turn out too bad.
SFC – Dunshaughlin
IFC – Meath Hill
JFC – Ballinlough
JFC B: Kilmainhamwood
You couldn’t but be full of admiration for clubs like Meath Hill and the ‘Wood. One of whom have already defied logic, expectation and all other manner of calculation to find themselves an hour away from senior football. While the other have done likewise if viewed through a slightly different lens. In no way could Meath Hill be described as a heavily populated area but, by comparison, if memory serves me correctly, it’s not all that long ago some of the class sizes in Kilmainhamwood NS were down to single digits in number. So what are genuine signs of a rebound for the Cavan border club are maybe even more noteworthy.
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On the other hand, If you wanted to talk about demographics, though, I’m sure it raises a few eyebrows to see Navan O’Mahonys currently operating at Intermediate level. Given that it is the county’s capital town. However, what can be assumed to be continued population growth in the greater Navan area appears to have benefitted clubs like Bective and Walterstown and Wolfe Tones to a greater degree than the ‘town’ clubs.
Then again, almost under the radar, Meath’s most famous club find themselves within touching distance of the top table once again. What’s more, it would be a brave punter who would wager against the hoops in a county final of any sort. That said, I am not about to change horses entering the home straight and would still fancy the club that’s as near to Monaghan as they are to Louth or Cavan to continue their remarkable rise through the echelons of Meath football.
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