As a member of the Sligo football panel since 1997, Sean Davey would have been forgiven for giving up hope on winning a Connacht championship medal. But the long wait finally came to an end last July when the Nestor Cup returned to the Yeats County after a 32-year lapse. One of the highlights of the sporting year was undoubtedly Sligo's first Connacht senior football championship triumph since 1975. The scenes of jubilation which greeted the provincial final victory over Galway were something to behold and brought a tear to the eye of Yeats County supporters all over the world. For some of the longer serving members of the Sligo panel, it was a case of third time lucky after the Connacht final defeats to Mayo and Galway in 1997 and 2002 respectively. Curry clubman Sean Davey made his championship debut in the '97 decider and has played in many big games since then, but has had to wait until now to get his hands on the Nestor Cup. "Next to winning an All-Ireland, this is the biggest thing that could happen to Sligo," he says. "This was a long time coming and there were times when you'd have almost lost hope. But we kept plugging away and finally got our reward this year. The final whistle in the Connacht final was a great moment - it was an indescribable feeling really. For the older lads like myself, it was as much relief as anything else." Since the introduction of the All-Ireland qualifier series in 2001, the Connacht all-blacks have enjoyed many fine victories and might have reached the All-Ireland semi-final in 2002 but for a controversial refereeing decision which saw Davey denied a late penalty in the quarter-final replay against Armagh. But frustratingly, they had nothing tangible to show for their efforts. "The runs we had in the back door were great and I suppose 2002 is the one that stands out when we beat Tyrone before losing to the eventual All-Ireland champions Armagh after a replay. But in terms of silverware, we had won nothing and that's why it was so satisfying to finally win a Connacht title this year. "It also meant an awful lot to the likes of Eamonn O'Hara, Padraig Doohan and Paul Taylor who have been involved for the past 10 or 12 years. It's just a pity that fellas like Dessie Sloyan and Paul Durcan weren't around long enough to savour this after the years of outstanding service they had given to Sligo." The powerful full forward, who has also featured at midfield and half forward over the years, believes the key to Sligo's success this year was their improved work-rate. "That was the big difference, we worked our socks off for each other and that's what won us the Connacht title. In the past, we had better individuals but we worked better as a team this year. "Tommy Breheny and John Kent deserve huge credit for instilling the work ethic in us because I don't think we would have won without it. I thought we played poorly enough in a few of our games, yet it still turned out to be our best year in 32 years," he adds. Since taking over the managerial reins in difficult circumstances in the spring of 2006, Tommy Breheny has completely turned Sligo's fortunes around. However, their form in the National League was patchy to say the least and they only avoided relegation to Division 4 of next year's restructured competition by virtue of a crucial victory over Mick O'Dwyer's Wicklow in the final round at Aughrim. "We had a poor league and it all boiled downed to the last game against Wicklow. Aughrim is never an easy place to go and get a win, but we played very well and won by four points. It was the first sign that things were coming together for us and we didn't lose against until the All-Ireland quarter-final against Cork four months later," Sean explains. The Yeats County opened their Connacht campaign on May 13 with a facile 2-18 to 1-3 victory over New York in what was the first ever championship match to be played on a synthetic surface at Gaelic Park. On a glorious day for football, it was all too easy for the visitors who never looked back after former All-Star Eamonn O'Hara blasted to the net inside the first minute. It took the Exiles 16 minutes to open their account and they wouldn't score again in the first half as Sligo went on to lead by 2-6 to 0-1 at the break, with Kieran Quinn fisting home their second goal on the stroke of half-time. It continued to be one-way traffic in the second half as the fitter and sharper visitors put further daylight between the sides, outscoring the home side by 0-8 to 1-1. Tommy Breheny's charges made the much shorter journey to Hyde Park for the provincial semi-final to face a Roscommon team that had high hopes of progressing to the decider. The signs looked encouraging for the Rossies when they led by 2-4 to 0-4 three minutes into the second half, but Sligo then suddenly burst into life and outscored their opponents by 0-9 to 0-1 in the remaining time to record a sensational 0-13 to 2-5 victory. The visitors opened the brighter and were full value for their 0-3 to 0-1 lead after 13 minutes. But Roscommon gradually found their feet and a Karl Mannion goal helped them to a 1-3 to 0-4 interval lead. Things got worse for Sligo on the restart when a second goal from Cathal Cregg was followed by a Ger Heneghan point. Suddenly, the deficit facing Sligo was six points and they looked to be in serious trouble. But against all the odds, they staged a tremendous comeback that would propel them into their first Connacht final in five years. Points from Mark Breheny, John McPartland and Sean Davey brought them back from the brink and they remained in the ascendancy until the final whistle to leave the home side stunned. In the lead-up to the provincial final, Sligo supporters wondered if this would finally be their year. Galway, under the management of former Yeats County boss Peter Ford, were hot favourites to take the title but, in a remarkable display of bravery, Sligo ended their long famine with a 1-10 to 0-12 victory. Although Mark Breheny opened the scoring for Sligo, it was all Galway in the early stages and they led by 0-5 to 0-2 after 15 minutes. Sligo hit back to level with points from Breheny (two) and Johnny Davey, only for Cormac Bane to immediately restore Galway's lead. On 25 minutes, however, the underdogs hit the front when centre back Michael McNamara sent in a long ball to David Kelly, who laid off to Eamonn O'Hara and the midfielder scored a cracking goal on the run to give Sligo a 1-5 to 0-6 lead. A point from John McPartland pushed them further ahead, but Galway registered three of the last four points of the half to trail by the minimum, 0-9 to 1-7, at half-time. Sligo were dealt a major blow early in the second half when O'Hara was forced to retire with an injury he picked while in the process of scoring his goal, and they were further unsettled by a number of poor wides. But incredibly, Galway went 34 minutes without a score until Padraig Joyce left the minimum in it after McNamara had sent Sligo supporters into raptures by kicking a massive point as four minutes of injury-time was announced. The Sligo faithful could hardly watch as one last chance fell to Jarlath Fallon, but to their relief, his effort drifted narrowly wide and the Yeats County were Connacht champions for only the third time in their history. Sligo had high hopes of continuing their fairytale run against beaten Munster finalists Cork in the All-Ireland quarter-final at Croke Park, but much to the disappointment of their huge travelling support, they didn't come anywhere near replicating their Connacht final performance and were soundly beaten by Cork in a poor quality contest. Trailing by 0-2 to 1-3 at half-time, Sligo needed to make a good start to the second half, but conceded points to Pearse O'Neill and Donnacha O'Connor in the first 70 seconds and eventually succumbed to a 0-8 to 1-11 defeat. The Sligo players were bitterly disappointed with their performance, but Cork's subsequent demolition of Meath in the All-Ireland semi-final showed them up in a better light. Davey concludes by saying: "Cork's didn't get the credit they deserved for beating us, but we are still very disappointed by how we performed against them. We didn't play to our potential and it was a very unsatisfactory way to end what had been a great year up until then." Tweet

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