DUBLIN DEFENDER CIAN O’Sullivan says his personal ‘impression’ is that veteran colleagues Alan Brogan and Denis Bastick will be part of the Sky Blues’ All-Ireland title defence in 2016.
Brogan spent last winter and spring mulling over his future before deciding to play on and turns 34 in January while midfielder Bastick will be 35 when the Championship begins.
Both players have young children and Bastick laid it on the line the day after September’s All-Ireland final win over Kerry when he said that by playing on he would essentially miss ‘another year’ of his son growing up.
But Bastick, who started the final, also conceded that playing for Dublin ‘is all I have known for 10 years’ and the indications so far, according to O’Sullivan, are that Bastick and Brogan will stay on.
That ultimately remains to be seen though with under three weeks until the first competitive game of 2016 — a January 3 O’Byrne Cup opener in Wexford — no news is probably good news.
“When you are coming off the back of a year like we’ve had, it’s hard to say that you are not going to come back again and give it another lash,” said O’Sullivan.
“As far as things are right now, I haven’t heard any indications that they won’t return and they are two massive players for us, just in terms of their leadership.
They have seen it all before and they are two guys that when they speak in the dressing room, everybody shuts up and listens. It would be a blow if they decided not to come back but, for now, I have every impression that they will.”
The lure of potential back to back titles may be strong and O’Sullivan himself admitted that it is a challenge he’s looking forward to. Dublin have won three All-Irelands since 2011 but failed to even return to the final in each of the years that they were defending champions.
“We were there in 2012 and 2014 and we know what it feels like and we are just really looking forward to the challenge of trying to win back to backs,” said O’Sullivan.
“It’s hard to pick out specifics about the previous times, the lessons, it’s just a really tall order, a hard feat to win back to back and it’s not going to come easy this time either.
“We were very well prepared in 2012 and 2014 and we just came up short against better opposition.”
O’Sullivan himself should be fit and ready to go for the Allianz league which begins with a high profile engagement with Kerry. He may even play some games in the O’Byrne Cup having recovered well from the hamstring concern that placed a large question mark over him ahead of the All-Ireland decider.
“I’m feeling alright,” said O’Sullivan, at the launch of the annual GOAL Mile challenge which takes place as normal at venues around the country throughout December.
“The hamstring is fully healed at this stage, rehab has gone well so feeling good. I haven’t played much football the last few weeks, just enjoyed the break really and feel well-rested so I’m looking forward to getting back training in the new year.”
O’Sullivan, with a history of hamstring problems, reflected on his All-Ireland final build up and admitted it was troublesome.
I couldn’t really test it out properly in the lead up to the final, it was a bit of an unknown whether it was going to hold up or not,” he said.
“I couldn’t do a full training session the week of the game because you’d run the risk of losing a day or two of recovery. It was kind of ninth hour stuff.
“Luckily it held out for 60 minutes which is probably as much as I could have hoped for.”
