Black card left "sour taste" in Cooper's mouth

Dublin's Jonny Cooper at the launch of the 2017 Allianz Football Leagues.
©INPHO/Donall Farmer.

Jonny Cooper admits that, from a personal point of view, his All-Ireland final black card took the shine off Dublin's incredible 2016 success.

As the Dubs battled to their fourth All-Ireland title in six years with victory in a replay against Mayo at Croke Park on Saturday, October 1st, influential 26-year-old defender Cooper was no longer on the field of play as he had been dismissed before the break for an innocuous foul on Mayo's Donal Vaughan

"It probably left a sour taste at the end of 2016 for me and gives me the bit between my teeth to get a jersey to try and play a bit more this year," the Na Fianna clubman told gaa.ie.

"One half of me was thinking, 'yeah, okay, the next man up will go in and do a job' and he did it better than I probably could have done it. The other half of me was thinking I'm there to show people what I've been working for and to try and show people what I can do. So it was a little bit bittersweet for me.

"I have my own standards for performance and those sorts of things. Coming off after a very short amount of minutes wouldn't be one of them. But it gives me a drive to clean up. I wasn't in a great mindset. They had just scored a goal down this end and I think it was the next play or within the next 30 seconds."