In 2005 Ballybay Pearse Brothers laboured to consolidate its reputation as the best intermediate football squad in the county the year before. However team captain Fergal Smyth comfortably guaranteed growing status as one of the finest defenders in the county. It seems like the Ballybay club and the career of 2005 club captain Fergal Smyth have been existing in parallel universes. Whenever the fiercely determined Smyth has been hitting the high notes, the maroon and whites have invariably been in their element. "I don't know about that," Fergal cautions. "There's been times when the team has been playing well and I haven't been doing the stuff. "Then again I thought I had a good enough year just gone by but the club struggled a bit," the ace defender declares. Fergal readily admits that the Smyth/club combination was always going to find it difficult to match the heroics of 2004. In all reality, the west county club had much more scope to scale the depths rather than the heights of Monaghan football, post-2004. Football's natural gravitational pull ordained that the club was always going to be fighting against the grain in asserting itself on the newer, higher plateau of senior football. It was the same story for 25-year old Fergal. When you receive a player of the year and man of the match trophies plus, of course, an intermediate championship medal, expectancy levels rise and the pressure to raise the bar comes with the territory. With so much kudos festooning the Smyth household in '04 and with the Pearse Brothers being rightly acclaimed as the superior of their peers, the pressure to consolidate progress was all-encompassing as the 2005 season kicked-in. The memory of what had gone before fuelled Ballybay's vim and vigour in the embryonic stage of the past season. For his part, the blue riband intermediate decider was a match that had Fergal itching to get going again. It was almost as if the break after the climax of the 2004 season broke everyone's momentum in Ballybay. 2004, for all sorts of reasons, is likely to last even longer in his memory that the club's glorious IFC success in 2001. While football is, for the most part, decided by the collective, the honour of being awarded such an individualistic honour as player of the match in his club's victory over Tyholland does understandably add to the sense of self-worth. "Getting the man of the match award was a great confidence booster and it did put the icing on the cake for me. "There's no point in my saying anything else. "But the big thing was that we beat Tyholland in the replay and I'd say if the rest of the lads hadn't done the business, there would have been no way I'd have been picking up an award . . . or a medal either!" The fact that Smyth and co. had clocked up successive league and championship victories over Tyholland and were clear favourites going into the '04 decider manage to dilute any of the satisfaction experienced in scooping the McCormick Cup. "We were confident going into the final and things went well for us in the replay. "Winning the intermediate was part of a great run of wins for us," said the team's 2004 vice-captain. Citing 2004 as "one of my best years", Fergal says that staying injury free is a major asset towards achieving one's personal goals and aiding the team's cause as one would wish. Fortunately for the 2005 team-captain everything was A-1 in that regard and he has enjoyed his football over the last couple of years, pressure or no pressure. Of course the fact that he received a call-up to the senior county team does help to put a spring in one's step. "I think most senior players would like to get a run with the county and I'm no different. "I was with the county at the start of the year, then had to pull out, and then I was back in the squad a few weeks before we got to the league final." A great experience no doubt? "Definitely. "Even though I only got on for about 15 minutes of the game against Meath, it was just amazing to get a run out in Croke Park and in front of such a crowd. "Vinny Corey was unlucky to get sin binned which gave me my chance and it's a memory that will stay a long time with me. "I don't think there's any player who doesn't look dream about playing in Croke Park at some stage and definitely that's been the highlight of my career so far." One of his own greatest critics, Fergal, a print management student in Dublin's Bolton Street College, believes that its incumbent on every player to try and be as consistently good as he possibly can. Consistency, he maintains, is the mark of a very good player. "There's so many things that makes up a great or very good player but, overall, you have to keep working at your game and try to improve all the time," says Fergal who played at county minor level under current senior supremo Seamus McEnaney. Over the course of the upcoming, increasingly brief 'close season' Fergal - in tandem with all players of ambition - will keep himself lean, mean and physical fit in preparation for county/club games ahead in the new season. A natural athlete, if ever there was one, the winning of a junior league and championship double and two intermediate championship medals as wel as underage medals have all helped to whet his appetite for further mementoes. He was naturally disappointed that no silverware came his way in 2005. It was a tough season for all concerned with Ballybay's premier team. "Senior football is hard and it takes everyone to be at the top of their game for things to go right during the year and maybe the commitment of the whole squad during the year wasn't what was needed. "We put a huge effort into getting up from junior to senior but then we seemed to take our feet off the pedals. "We got a bit complacent instead of maybe pushing on and building on the intermediate win. "The bottom fell out of the year for us. "We shouldn't have ended up fighting against relegation considering the talent that's in the squad and the tradition the club has. "There were a few games that we should have won but I suppose every team could say the same thing." The frustration of Ballybay's 2005 innings grates with Fergal all the more so because he's convinced "there isn't much difference between the couple of teams at the bottom of the table and the ones up around the middle." But the club's outstanding full-back understands that the league table doesn't lie and perhaps the maroon and whites ended up where they deserved to be on foot of their season-like inconsistencies. And he recognises that Ballybay are possibly still struggling to come to terms with the departure of experienced hands like Cathal Linden and Barry Duffy, both former key players when the 2001 IFC title was annexed. "We've a very young team and maybe a bit more experience would go a long way towards making us a better team. "We're maybe lacking a bit of power too. We were probably at our best a couple of years ago but we're missing too many pieces in the jigsaw." Trying to work the oracle at the highest level in Monaghan football circles is difficult; perhaps no less difficult than in any other county. Interestingly while happy to see underage teams amalgamate - such as St. Patricks - he is not in favour of the likes of Ballybay and a neighbouring club coming together in an attempt to scoop the SFC title. "I played on an amalgamation team of Killanny and ourselves at minor level and I enjoyed the experience and working to gel with new team-mates but I think the tradition is against clubs at adult level coming together. "I don't think it would do much for football in the county." Not totally convinced by the present back-door system either, Fergal reckons that a knock-out format is the best of all; best for the clubs and best for the development of football in the county. Meanwhile talk of county matters turns his attention to the high-profile inter-county scene in 2006. "We raised the bar in 2005 so now we have to step it up and look towards doing something in the championship. "I know the Armagh game will be very tough but we beat them in the championship before and the prospect of taking on the winners of the Antrim versus Fermanagh match for a place in the final should give us every incentive as if we needed one." Tweet

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