Longwood on the rise
November 27, 2010For Longwood in 2009, everything just came together. Champions in Intermediate Hurling and Junior Football, with a significant cross-over between the two sides, in some ways it was a case of a rising tide lifting all boats. Long-serving Enda Dixon was the full back on both teams and, as he contemplates the approach of his 36th birthday, he has no plans to hang up the boots or dump the hurley in the garden shed just yet.
"We've had a core group there for a few years and we had made it to a good few finals and semi-finals before eventually making the breakthrough," he says. "The goal at the start of 2009 was to win as much as we could, but it was an unbelievable achievement to win both the Junior Football and Intermediate Hurling. We've so many dual players that I thought it might be a step too far to challenge in both, that if we concentrated on one or the other we'd have a great chance. I never even contemplated winning both.
"The way it turned out, we were very lucky with injuries in both football and hurling all year. No stone was left unturned - we had Ollie Canning from Galway down for a training session before the hurling final and a lot of what he said brought it home to us. The ethos he had was all about hard work, pressure, support play, which helped to drive it on another bit.
"When you're playing and winning, everyone's enjoying it and you've no problem getting 20 or 25 down at training. During the winter the nights were drawing in and the weather was turning bad, but everyone was still very keen. We were playing against teams from other counties in the Leinster Junior Campionship, and everyone just wanted to play, so it wasn't hard to keep it going. We played St Mochta's in the Leinster final at our pitch and I remember thinking before the game that I wouldn't be too disappointed to lose it. It had been a great year. It started in January and here we were, in December, still going strong."
The year didn't end there, however, with Longwood scrambling a draw after extra-time before lifting the Leinster cup with victory over Mochta's in Louth the following week. Thereafter they came up against Castlegregory in the All-Ireland semi-final, which proved a bridge too far, with the Kerry outfit claiming the Meath men's scalps en route to All-Ireland success over Kiltimagh of Mayo.
"Castlegregory were very strong," recalls Dixon, "but we felt we let ourselves down a bit on the day. We were disappointed with how we played, but they were a very physically strong team. Everything had gone right - the preparations were good, we travelled down to Limerick the night before and stayed in a hotel, had a training session in UL. We held them well in the first half but they blew us away in ten minutes in the second."
With scarcely a break to recharge the batteries, the Longwood lads were back in action in their debut year in intermediate football and senior hurling. If a hangover from their 2009 exertions may have been understandable, it certainly wasn't forthcoming, in the early part of the year at least.
"The way things were going over the two years, one ran into the next so we started off this year flying," he says. "After the draw was made for the intermediate football we targeted a few teams that we may be able to pick up a few points against, and we started well with wins over Syddan and Castletown. We probably caught those two on the hop a bit but we had Na Fianna next and knew that if we could win that, we would be in with a real shot of the knock-out stages. We managed to win it, so everyone was pretty happy. We saw that as a gauge of our progress, that we could really compete and hold our own in intermediate."
Just as a title challenge for a second successive year began to range into view, however, disaster struck with key players picking up injuries in the space of a couple of torrid weeks. Michael Burke, county regular and the club's leading light, key forward Aaron Ennis and Meath minor star Eoin Lynch were all ruled out by long-term injury, and the season faltered.
"Michael has been the real driving force behind us for the past few years and he broke his leg playing for Meath. He was still coming down to training to try to drive us but he was a huge loss on the field. Eoin also broke his leg and Aaron broke a bone in his hand. Longwood is still a fairly small club and we can't afford to be missing lads like that. St Michael's gave us a good hiding to be honest, and we were fairly well beaten by Dunderry in the quarter-finals after that. Teams like Michael's and Dunderry are seasoned intermediate teams, though. You need all your players fit and available to be going in against them."
All in all, it was a productive first year in the grade, and one which leaves everyone in Longwood convinced about their abilities to challenge for outright honours in 2011. "Definitely, yeah," says Enda. "We've played a good few of the intermediate teams in the league anyway, and we wouldn't be worried about facing anyone. It's been a long 18 months or so for us, but once we can get everyone back fit, and get everyone hungry for it again, we'll hopefully give it a good shot."
In hurling, it would be fair to say, Dixon is a little less bullish - at the top level of the small ball code, it could be all about survival over the next couple of years. "We were in the same group as Dunboyne, Killyon and Kildalkey this year, so it was always going to be hard. We started off well enough, beat Clann na Gael, lost to Dunboyne and drew with O'Mahony's in a game we probably should have won. At the end of it all, though, I was just happy enough to maintain our senior status.
"We have a bigger panel for the football. In hurling, the team has been together a long time and a lot of us are into our 30s now. We'll try to keep ourselves in senior for as long as we can, and hopefully that's long enough for some of the young lads to come through - the club has won U14, U16 and minor over the last few years, and a lot of those lads are coming through now. They're still a bit raw, and if we can stay senior long enough to bring them through then that's the best place for them to learn."
For the club as a whole, playing at the highest level in hurling and with hopes of reaching football's senior grade in the coming years, things are as good as they've ever been.
With wife Joyce and two children at home, and twins on the way, Enda could be forgiven for thinking about life after GAA. Not for the time being, though. "If I wasn't playing football or hurling I don't know what I'd be doing," he says. "I'll give it another year anyway. Everything is great in the club these days. There's a new population in Longwood over the last few years but when they bring their kids up to the club, they see the top-class facilities we have, including the new Astroturf pitch which is all fenced in and very safe for the children's drills.
"A lot of people deserve plenty of praise for the work that has been done. Noel Kerrigan. Tony and Pat Healy. Mick Hogan on the hurling side of things. And there's the 'Monday night gang', who go up every week doing the maintenance, cleaning out the dressing-rooms and showers, mowing the pitch. There's a core group of people there and it makes it easy for us to just show up and play."
And you never know, if Longwood maintain their progress on the football field, Enda Dixon could be running out senior championship matches by the spring of 2012? "If that happens," he laughs, "then I'll bow out happy!"
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If the success of both adult sides in 2009 undoubtedly galvanised the whole village behind the club, the highlight for Longwood over the past year - in terms of silverware at least - was the success of the St Finian's side, an amalgamation with Ballivor, in the Division 2 minor league in May.
Part of the foundations for the success lay in the victory of the St Fintina's school side which had won the North Leinster 'D' title under trainers Morven Connolly and Padraig Brennan. The Finian's lads, however, didn't exactly carry all before them en route to the Division 2 minor title. Instead, a bit like a thoroughbred racehorse, they timed their challenge to perfection, bouncing back from earlier defeats to Skryne and Ballinlough/Inny Gaels to overcome those two sides in the semi-final and final respectively.
The game against Skryne brought the Longwood-Ballivor collective face to face with Liam Tolan, the exceptional young Meath minor forward who would tragically lose his life later in the summer.
Rory Maguire, Longwood's former inter-county forward who lined out for the Meath juniors in 2010, was part of the management team alongside Ballivor's Diarmuid McCluskey. Reflecting on the latter stages of the Division 2 victory, Maguire says, "We knew we were up against it against Skryne. Liam Tolan, God rest him, was the main man. We had two lads back sweeping in front of him, but he still managed to score a couple of goals. He's a great loss to the game in the county."
St Finian's came through in the end to set up a final clash with the Ballinlough-Inny Gaels combination. So having got the better of a traditional stronghold such as Skryne, were they confident going into the decider? "I wouldn't say we were confident, no," says Rory. "I don't think we were confident of winning any of our games. We'd lost to them earlier in the year so were going into the game as underdogs. But we prepared well and the ball just seemed to hop our way on the day."
As for the players, would it be unfair to single anyone out for special praise? "I'd have to single out Eoin Lynch to be honest," says Rory. "He was our captain and was centre back on the Meath minors, and he's going to be a great footballer. He broke his foot and missed part of the year but he put a huge effort in. I'd also give a big mention for Thomas Raleigh and Adam Gannon, two Ballivor lads who played in the junior final against Ballinabrackey, and Sean Sheridan, who's hopefully going to be on the Meath minors next year.
"I'd also have to pay tribute to Diarmuid McCluskey from Ballivor, who has done a lot of great work over the past few years."
The St Finian's panel which overcame Ballinlough-Inny Gaels in the Division 2 League final in May: Garry Sherrock; Matt Rickard, Damien Healy, Chris Lynch; Shane Farrell, Thomas Raleigh, Colm Hackett; Eoin Lynch, Francis Doran; Ryan Keenan, Sean Sheridan, Coran Byrne; Gavin Mullen, Jason Delaney, Adam Gannon. Subs: David Fagan, Conor Keenan, Marcus Thompson, Paddy McGourty, Conor Clarke, Karl Sherrock, Josh Ryan, Shane Kenny, John Murray, Darren McCarthy, Dean Ward, Albin Marowski, Sean Dalton, Sean McGee, Sean Colgan. Tweet
