IN TAKING ON the role as Derry manager, he left himself wide open for accusations and judgement. But it’s never been Mickey Harte’s way to worry about what others think of him. It’s always been just about football.
Still. There’s a tiny bit of personal gratification for himself and his assistant, Gavin Devlin after they delivered a first top-level national title for Derry, and indeed Harte, since 2008.
“It’s very good. It’s excellent,” he said.
“We were taking over a team that had performed very well and had a lot of quality, had built up that status over the last number of years. We certainly didn’t want to bring them back. What we’ve done to date is maybe a sign that we’re bringing them forward a little bit.”
The last time they met, Derry played a much weakened team in the league. If it was a gamble, it paid off. But Harte still notes that a gamble only looks good while bathed in the light of victory.
“I don’t know if you could speculate about all sorts of things. It was a decision we made and we felt it was the right decision at the time. And because we won today it might seem to validate that but look, life’s not as simple as that its quite more complex,” he said.
The star of the show for Derry was Eoin McEvoy. Just 20 years old, he is the veteran of an Ulster title and has changed the way Derry play by freeing up Brendan Rogers to play midfield.
Here, he was in an advanced position of centre-back and plundered 2-2 in an outstanding performance.
“I watched him obviously before we were with Derry and he played full-back for them – a very young man, under-20 I think last year. I always thought he had a great maturity about him for his age, he has a great stature, great presence – and obviously he’s a very good footballer too,” said Harte.
“Today he cut loose, put that attacking end onto his game. Probably playing full-back he didn’t get as many chance to go up the field as that, but he had him at six today and it certainly turned out a very good move for us.”
Derry and Dublin have met in the league four times in the last two years and finally, a spiky rivalry is emerging with added pulling and dragging. It’s an inevitability.
“I suppose when you have two teams at a high level and they are consistent at that level then when they run across each other we would expect good games and a lot of rivalry and lot of energy going both ways and that happens you know?” said Harte.
“I don’t think we have the right to say we are the top two teams in the country. Lots of other people have claim to that as well.
“Dublin have the best claim to being a top team, Derry are still a team on the up, I believe they are progressing to be a really top tier team and this league season has endorsed that claim.”
A question raised over Derry was that they hadn’t beaten a top tier team in Croke Park and they needed to get over that hump. Both teams went at this with everything but still the losers can write it off instantly because, well, the league.
“Well, you’re playing the All-Ireland champions, they’re a team of serious force this last number of years. They have plenty of titles, loads of All-Ireland medals and all of that,” says Harte.
“While this isn’t an All-Ireland, as in the ‘Sam Maguire’ kind of affair, it’s good for a team that five years ago played against Leitrim in the Division 4 final.
“That is serious progress to come from there. I’d have felt they never were a Division 4 team, they had the quality to be not in that division, but they found themselves there.
“To go from there to where they have gone now there’s a great sense of achievement. I think it will only do them good.”
