Despite losing their senior championship crown last Summer, there's no sign of anyone in Gowna making a dash to strike the panic button. Those privy to what made Gowna great in the nineties are determined to see the club bounce back sooner rather than later. Here, Kevin Carney talks to club stalwart Phil O'Reilly. The good and honest gaels of Gowna are used to taking things on the chin. After all, it's less than 30 years ago that the club was on the cusp of linking up with the dodo in the land of the gone and almost forgotten. Over the course of the eighties and nineties though, the archetypal small, closely-knit club evolved into one of the most potent outfits in Cavan football circles. Gowna were the team of the nineties in Cavan and while the club members were understandably bitterly disappointed to lose their title last Summer, there's not an ounce of bitterness to be garnered Gowna-way: "I wouldn't say there's a single person who'd begrudge the Gaels their win. Just like we came to the fore at senior level after a run of great underage success, Cavan Gaels finally reaped the reward of so much good work down the years. "When we made the breakthrough in 1988, we had eleven under 21 players on the team and that stood to us in the years that followed. The club won three minor championship and three under 21 championships in the run-up to '88 and a lot of those fellas went on to make up the body of the senior team for many years afterwards. "All credit to the the Gaels though. They were the better team on the day and although we felt confident at the start of the year that we could defend our senior title, it wasn't to be on the day of the final," Phil O'Reilly, outgoing club chairman comments. Reflecting on the team's championship campaign, Phil reckons that the Gowna team displayed signs of increasing weariness as the games piled up. After so many years at the top, he believes some of the elder citizens on the team also showed an understandable weakening in their appetite for football. And the facts back up Phil's theory. Dermot McCabe, for instance was playing in his eighth county final since emerging onto the Gowna senior team at 17 years of age just nine years ago. Others such as Bernard Morris, the Hartins and Christy Madden had accumulated similar mileage on the club. "The more seasoned players, at least seven or eight of them on the team, must have been finding it hard to sustain their enthusiasm this year after being part of so many successful championship campaigns. "Our run of senior championship titles had to come to an end at some stage but we honestly didn't expect the Gaels to come good in 2001. A lot of us felt that they weren't quite ready to go the distance and with so many young players on board that it would be at least another year or two before they were ready to lift the title. "Even when the final came around, I myself was still confident that we were going to win. I didn't think they had been particularly impressive during the championship - they had struggled a bit in some games. They kept their best wine 'till last for their meeting with us though unfortunately." In checking back on the county final defeat in finer detail, the approachable Gowna clubman, who was part of the Gowna panel that won the junior championship title in 1982, admits that the Gowna players, collectively, didn't play to their potential and the Gaels' achievement in winning the midfield battle over the course of the hour - particularly in the first half - was decisive. In addition, the former long-time club PRO wonders what way things would have transpired had Gerald Pierson not been stopped - en route for goal - in his tracks by James Doonan. Also, Phil reckons that if Gowna had managed to add sufficiently to Dermot McCabe's early second half goal they could have went onto win the tie. "Instead of us keeping them under pressure, the Gaels got possession from the kick-out after the goal and went up the field and scored a point I think that score was important from a psychological point of view," adds Phil who says the defeat was a sore end-of-season result and one which came around despite the best efforts of Dessie Brady and his assistants during the year. Perhaps not surprisingly, Phil - brother of likeminded club stalwarts Declan and Eamonn - insists that anyone who's prepared to write Gowna's obituary now will do so at their peril. While acknowledging that the Gaels will be very difficult to beat in the years ahead and that the current county town squad is just in the maturation stage, he firmly believes that a year removed from the winners' enclosure could be just the tonic for the weary Gowna troops. Just like the genesis of Cavan Gaels' trip to the top, the foundation of Gowan's senior success over the last ten years was engineered out of the club's underage stable. In some ways though, Gowna's relative lack of underage success in more recent days suggests that the club's run of senior titles might have been more than even Gowna gaels could have anticipated. "I think the last couple of championship wins were a bit of a bonus to us even though the last couple of winning teams were probably the best teams we've had of the six senior championship winning teams. "Not too many people involved in the club would have thought that we'd be still within five points of another title win come 2001. We honestly thought that our best years might have been behind us once 1995 came and went. "It's very hard for a small club like ours to keep the talent flowing every year from underage level up through to senior ranks. Realistically, we'd be happy to get one or two fellas every year from under 10s upwards with good potential for senior football," explains Phil who worked alongside the late Phelim Reilly when Gowna won five consecutive under 16 titles, three minor and an under 21 championship title prior to their aforementioned success in '88. Certainly if Gowna can discover talent like Mark McKeever, Paddy Brady, Ciaran Fitzpatrick and Niall Madden within their underage nursery over the next few years, one can see Gowna's stay in the peleton of Cavan football being extended for quite a while to come. It's interesting to note that while Phil admits that the current Gaels squad has the potential to win another five or six consecutive blue riband titles, he firmly believes that the biggest hurdle to their aspirations in that regard will be mounted by the Gowna club. "When you consider that we went all the way to the county final without really performing to our best and still hadn't a hard match up until the final, it's obvious that we're not far off being number one in the county. A couple of years ago, the likes of Mullahoran, Bailieboro and to a lesser extent Crosserlough could have said they were the number two in the county but not anymore." In speculating about the times which lie ahead for Gowna, Phil is mindful of the fact that the club has a constant battle on its hands with regard to the 'numbers game.' Although the club has the 'pick' of two primary schools, its an almost annual trial to gather up sufficient players to field full teams at every underage level. "Getting enough players together is a problem most years. The local population has remained fairly static over the years but fortunately practically every young fella in the area plays football thanks in the main to the great work which is being done for a long time now by the likes of Barry Hughes, Eamon Lynch and Eamon Reilly at underage level. "It's crucial that we make the most of what we see emerging at underage level. With a few of the more senior players obviously coming close to the time when they're bound to consider whether or not to stay on, we will probably need to tap into the best of talent that's coming through from minor." Either way, Phil assures us that Gowna will not waste time on licking their wounds. Instead, they'll keep their heads down and redouble their efforts at reclaiming their erstwhile number one spot. And who'd bet against O'Reilly and co. celebrating another blue riband championship title win next autumn. Tweet

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