Friday, December 30, 2016

EVERY team needs a tough guy and it’s no coincidence that Kildare’s best team since the Mick O’Dwyer era coincided with the peak years of Daryl Flynn’s career.

After winning a Leinster Under 21 title in 2004 as an 18 year old, and losing the following year’s decider, Flynn was in and around the Kildare panel for 12 years before hanging up his boots this year but it was the three years between 2009 and 2011 where he really made his reputation.

Although he was on the panel under five different managers, a succession of injuries meant that apart from a seven minute substitute appearance against Louth in 2014, the other 28 of his 29 Championship appearances came under Kieran McGeeney.

In many ways, he was the archetypical Kieran McGeeney footballer. Tough, uncompromising, hard working, and in a team which was renowned for being fit and strong, Flynn was fitter and stronger than most.

He eventually made his Championship debut a few months short of his 23^rd birthday in Kieran McGeeney’s first Championship game, a defeat to Wicklow at Croke Park, but it was a long road to get to that point.

“In 2004 we won the Leinster U21, Peter McConnon was the manager but Padraig Nolan (senior manager at the time) was a selector and I remember he came up to me and said ‘we’re going to bring you into the senior panel and get you training there’ and I remember him saying to me ‘in a couple of years you could be playing with Dermot’,” said Flynn.

“I went in and trained away and I remember my first Championship game on the panel was in 2004 against Wexford, we were beaten in that. It was an experience to be just in there training. I remember one of my first nights in training, I was new in so I was trying to take it all in, I remember Derek McCormack caught a ball and then Anthony Rainbow and Glenn Ryan sandwiched him with a shoulder each side. I was thinking then ‘this is the real thing, this is what has to be done if I’m going to make it here.’

“I was with the 21s again in 2005 we got to a Leinster final but I had a few injuries and I was in and out of the panel with Padraig. Under John Crofton, I had two years in pre season training but had couple of injuries again, we had a good run with the club and I never got a game. Kieran gave me my first start in 2008, against Wicklow. I think there were five of us who made their debuts that day, myself, Chalky, Smithy, Morgan O’Flaherty and Keith Cribbin. It was great to get a start and the team got on a bit of a run after that and I was coming on and then 2009 was my first good run in the team,” said Flynn.

That game against Wicklow proved to his last Championship start that year, although he did make three substitute appearances as Kildare came through the Qualifiers before losing an All-Ireland quarter-final to Cork, but by the time of the 2009 Championship Flynn was one of Kildare’s key men.

Dermot Earley was coming to the end of his days at intercounty level and wasn’t quite as mobile as he used to be but at stage of his career his experience was allowing him to play some of his best football. What he needed to really let him prosper was a younger man who could do the dirty unseen work and let him rampage forward. That was where Flynn came in. Completely without ego, Flynn was happy to do the work that sometimes supporters don’t notice. When Kildare were pouring forward, Flynn was busy looking in the opposite direction to see where were the gaps that needed to be filled in case the attack broke down. That sort of attitude let Earley’s brilliance flourish and during 2009 there were few, if any, better midfield partnerships in the country. Earley ended the year with an All-Star but he would be the first to acknowledge that his individual award wouldn’t have been possible without Flynn’s hard work.

“That was just my role,” said the modest Flynn.

“Kieran was very good at giving specific roles so when you have me and Dermot together we knew, and I don’t mind saying it now, that he was a better shooter than, he’s not that good but still better than me! So we let him going forward and kick the points and I’d just go back and work hard, dispossess and throw myself around. I didn’t mind at all, once you are playing you’ll do anything you are told to do. I was happy in that role, I wouldn’t be one for dummy solos, kicking off the right and left foot, I’d just get the ball and handpass it off to Leper (Eamonn Callaghan) or Johnny (Doyle) or Dermot and let them do the rest,” he said.

The year turned out to be one of heartache though. Kildare led 14 man Dublin at half time in the Leinster Final but couldn’t see things through and their year ended once again in the All-Ireland quarter-final when they lost by two points to Tyrone.

Still, hopes were high going into 2010 that it could be Kildare’s year but the Championship started disastrously when they lost in Leinster to Louth.

Earley missed that game but was back in the team for the Qualifer tie against Antrim, the same day of his father’s funeral, and although Kildare only managed a draw on that emotionally charged evening, with their dynamic midfield back together they gradually began to build some momentum.

Kildare moved through the Qualifiers back to the last eight stage with Flynn and Earley seemingly the perfect midfield pairing but then disaster struck.  Just four minutes into the quarter-final Earley’s injury jinx returned and at a time when he was playing some of his best ever football, a cruciate injury meant he would never again start a Championship game  for Kildare.

But Kildare still had Flynn in top form and some very able deputies and they were good enough to beat the Royals and set up Kildare’s first All-Ireland semi-final since 2000.

Going into that game against Down without Earley, the last player that Kieran McGeeney would have wanted to pick up an injury was Flynn but although Kildare had a lot of things going for them during McGeeney’s time one thing they never seemed to have was luck and before half time, Flynn was forced out of the game. Kildare had good players to step into the breach around midfield but Flynn and Earley were pretty much the best around by then and their loss had to have an impact on team.

“It was tough,” agreed Flynn.

“I remember we lost Dermot in the game against Meath but you look at the squad we had at the time. Hugh Lynch came in there and had a great game against Meath and then again against Down. I got injured against Down but Ronan Sweeney was there to come on so we had a good squad. It was disappointing though to have to go off in the biggest game of the year. I remember talking to Hugh Campbell in the build up to that game and he was saying to me that I had played every minute of every game from the O’Byrne Cup, through the league and through the Championship and just to keep it going so maybe he jinxed me!” he said.

Losing one midfielder at that crucial point of the season was unlucky, losing both of them was just outright cruel and Kildare were left wondering what might have been once again.

“That game was demoralising, being so close. I think we would have definitely beaten Cork in the final,” said Flynn.

Injuries were starting to bite by 2011 and he missed out on another crushing defeat, a one point loss to Dublin in the Leinster semi-final, but was back in the team for the Qualifier series. That brought Kildare to an All-Ireland quarter-final against Donegal and perhaps one of Flynn’s best performances in a Kildare jersey.

But again it was to end in heartbreak for Kildare. Three late Lilywhite points forced the game into extra time and they led by three at half time in extra time but four points in a row from Donegal, including a last minute winner by Kevin Cassidy, killed off Kildare’s challenge and looking back now, was the beginning of the end for McGeeney’s team.

“You always think do you have any regrets and the biggest regret is that we never won anything. Those three years were definitely the years that we should have at least got a Leinster at the minimum. Looking back, we did everything we could as players, management, we threw everything at it for three years, that’s just football for you. In 2009 we got to the Leinster final, we were two points at half time against 14 men, we lost. In 2010, there was that Benny Coulter square ball goal against Down and then in 2011 there was that Kevin Cassidy kick at the end,” said Flynn.

“I think the 2011 team, that game set us back a bit. You saw where Donegal went after that,” he added.

“Those three years were great, we had a great team, great team morale, it was like a club team, we’d do anything for each other and even now I’d still be talking to lads and we’d always end up talking about 2010, 2011. We had good craic but were serious at the time when we needed to be, but that’s football, we won nothing,” said Flynn.

Injuries ruined much of 2012 for the Moorefield man, although he was shown his only Championship red card for Kildare during his only Championship start that season, a Leinster semi-final defeat to Meath.

 

 

He was back to regular football during 2013 but by then, McGeeney’s Kildare weren’t quite the same force they were and their season ended in St Conleths Park in the Qualifiers against Tyrone.

That game turned out to be McGeeney’s last game in charge and also Flynn’s last Championship start.

It wasn’t for the want of trying, he gave as much as anybody during Jason Ryan’s two years and Cian O’Neill’s first in charge but his body always broke down at a crucial time.

“My last full game was against Tyrone in St Conleths, in Kieran’s last game. I came on against Louth under Jason for a few minutes in 2014 but the injuries just caught up with me. Ankles, groins, they all took their toll. It would be great for a while and you’d be training away but then the body would break down close to Championship.

“Last year I was training away and got a dead leg a couple of weeks before the Championship, I thought I’d be back pretty quick but I was out for five weeks. It’s just hard to get back then when you are trying to catch up with the likes of Daniel Flynn, Tommy Moolick, Fergal Conway, the boys are flying. I just kept breaking down, breaking down so while I’m half held together I just thought it would be nice to go back to the club and have a few years there with them,” said Flynn, who typically left the panel without much fuss.

“I told Cian about two weeks after the Mayo game, I rang him and told him that was me done. I kind of knew through the year, I knew it was coming. I rang Cian and told him and he asked me did I want to announce it and I said I’d just tell him and the players and that would be it and I’d just kind of glide away. I’m not on Twitter or Facebook or any of that kind of thing.”

Looking back over his career it’s easy to see how much of an influence Kieran McGeeney had on him. It was perfect timing really, McGeeney was the perfect manager for Flynn but equally, Flynn was the perfect player for McGeeney.

“Kieran came in near the end of 2007. We were after winning the club championship and were going well with Moorefield. He was such a fantastic player, the first time I met him was in St Conleths and after that meeting I came out thinking ‘this is it, I want to give a lot because I really want to play under this man, I want to learn off him’. In fairness to Kieran, once you gave everything for him, he’d give everything back to you in spades. I learned a lot under Kieran, it was great to play under him. He was so precise, everything he did he did it with a fine tooth comb. We never won anything but to win something for him would have been great. The way things happened then when he was ousted was sad to see. The work that he put in was unbelievable, Niall Carew was there too, Paul Grimley, Aidan O’Rourke, John Rafferty, Hugh Campbell, Briar (Morgan O’Callaghan), all the people he brought into the set up added so much to things. People probably thought that Kieran was a grumpy old man but once you knew him, obviously when he was playing he was very tough and that but once you knew him and got on his good side you could have a laugh with him. People probably didn’t see that side of him but the players did. We’d still talk and there is plenty of slagging between us, he’s a good lad and I owe him a lot. He gave me my debut and all my best runs for Kildare were under Kieran, I’m very thankful for him,” said Flynn.

Although he was never one for the limelight or glaze of the media, Flynn was very much part of the unique team spirit within the Kildare ranks, particularly during McGeeney’s time, and that is the one thing that he will miss most.

“You obviously miss the games, but you’d really miss the dressing room. In Hawkfield before training, or even after training, with Roli, Dermot, Johnny, Bolton, Mikey, Leper, Hughie Lynch, all these lads. Just the bond that we had as players, you make friends for life there and you’d miss that big time. Maybe not so much now when it is dark and cold! But you’d miss the craic, you’d hear the lads are training hard and I’ll just be hoping the boys can do. They are putting in huge effort and there is a new management team there and you know that no stone will be left unturned. Kildare fans can be hard to keep happy but it’s not for the want of trying that Kildare football is in the position that it is in at the moment. There is great young talent there and it’s just a matter of getting it right on the day,” he said.

It’s perfectly apt that looking back through his time with Kildare the game Flynn highlights wasn’t one of the big Croke Park Championship games. Instead, he remembers a league game against Kerry in 2008, a day he learned a big lesson about what it took to make it at the top from a GAA legend. The Kildare Nationalist’s John Roddy saw at the time in his report about Flynn’s performance: ‘What a baptism of fire for a young fellow to be thrown in on Darragh Ó Sé. Kept his end up manfully and must have learned an awful lot over the course of the 70 minutes’. It turned out that Flynn had indeed learned a lot.

“I always remember that league game against Kerry. Kieran asked me to mark Darragh Ó Sé, and obviously he’s a phenomenal footballer. In the first couple of minutes I was running down the line with Darragh and he just turned and hit me a box basically. Kieran and Niall Carew saw it but the referee didn’t because obviously these Kerry boys are cute hoors. They came over to me and said next ball that comes in the air to just go through him and command a bit of respect from him. I did that, and it was grand after that. I was happy enough to play against such a fantastic footballer and to mark him and play well. That was probably the highlight of my career,” said Flynn.

He had already shown his steel at underage level and for his club at that stage but that was maybe the day he learned that there are no prisoners taken around the middle third at the top level. He wasn’t the only tough guy on the Kildare team then though. He admits that there were times that he walked a disciplinary tightrope but that was what helped make him the player he was.

“We had a few lads like that, somebody like Andrew McLoughlin was no pushover. Lads were well able to look after themselves, like Flanno, we had a lot of lads like that. It was just my style, if you see somebody hitting one of your team mates, you get involved and you try to look after the man beside you. Sometimes I did overstep the line a bit but that was just part of it sometimes,” said Flynn.

He will now turn his attention to his club football. A Moorefield man through and through, he played on winning teams from under 10 all the way up to minor, under 21, senior and then most memorably of all at Leinster level with his club in 2006. His one regret was that he never gained to experience that winning feeling in a white jersey.

“That probably hurt Kildare though, we were so used to winning at Moorefield, won minor, won under 21, won senior, won Leinster but then with Kildare we won nothing. It was hard going from winning a lot to winning nothing. They say winning a Leinster with Kildare is brilliant, obviously I don’t know but winning a Leinster with Moorefield, fellas you grew up with and played with since under 9, under 10 10 was something else.”

Although he unfortunately got plenty of practise of losing big games for Kildare, that was something that he never got used to.

“I wasn’t a great loser, still amn’t probably. The wife and the kids wouldn’t be mad about football but they’d know by the time I got home that Daddy has a face on. You’d be thick but again, that’s just who I am.”

And no matter what the result was, he was always glad to head back home to his family, those that him best.

“I consider my fortunate to have had the career I did and to have the people around me. Padraig, Johnny Crofton, Kieran, Jason, Cian. I have to thank all the players involved over the last 12 years or so and a big thanks to my family. They’ve been behind me from day one, my wife Audrina, my two kids, my mother, my father, my sisters, I’d just like to thank them for the support they have given me. I’ve had good days and bad days but no matter what else was happening, the family were always there for me.”

 

Written by Ger McNally