IT’S CLOSING IN on 12 months since Diarmuid Connolly last laced up his boots to kick a ball. As it stands, a low-key Division 2 championship win against Ballyboughal could well mark the final football game of the St Vincent’s clubman’s career.
By the sounds of it, he’ll be happy enough if that proves to be the case. Sitting in the courtyard of the Croke Park hotel, just a few yards from the ground where he enjoyed so many memorable days with both St Vincent’s and Dublin, Connolly insists he doesn’t miss the thrills of the game – even on a week like this, when old foes Mayo are due to make the trip to the capital.
“I finished up in ‘18 and I made my peace,” Connolly explains.
“I was done with it, and obviously I came back in ‘19, late in the season in ‘19, and I knew, I had sat down with my family, a couple of my close friends, with the management team and a lot of the guys on the team and made the decision to come back for a couple of months but I knew that that’s all it was.”
For now his immediate focus is on the small ball, having recently taken up an invitation from Pat Gilroy to tog out with the Vincent’s hurlers again.
The six-time All-Ireland SFC winner retired from Dublin duty at the age of 33. When asked about being part of such a golden period for Dublin football, he points to the strength of the collective and says the successes he enjoyed with Vincent’s – winning All-Irelands in 2008 and 2016 – stand as the most significant achievements of his life in football. Listening to him reflect on a remarkable career, he makes it sound like it was an easy decision to step away from the intercounty game.
“There’s a lot of miles on the clock and, also, I wanted to pursue other angles, other parts of my life as well.
A lot of that took a hit by playing for Dublin for so long. The time and effort that you put into it, I don’t think I had the fire anymore either.
“I think that kind of died out a little bit and when that happens, in my opinion, if that happens to a player, you kind of have to take a step back.
“When I came back in ‘19, I wasn’t the same player that I was in ‘17 or ‘16 or the years previous. I was the one driving the standards. I was the one doing the extra stuff. I was the one getting up early in the morning but I wasn’t doing that and it’s not a mindset thing, it’s something that changed… I just saw the bigger picture and yeah, I’d enough of it at that stage.”
He admits the attention that came his way off the pitch didn’t exactly help. Throughout his playing career, Connolly found himself at the centre of a number of high-profile incidents. He feels that at times, the coverage around him stepped over the line.
“I’m a private person. Sport is sport, it’s a hobby at the end of the day. I try to keep my private stuff private. Mostly that’s been respected, sometimes it hasn’t been. And that pisses me off to be honest with you. If someone did step out of line like that, they just wouldn’t get access again. That’s how it works. But no, I just… I’m a private person, I’m not mad about the media stuff. I think it has a place obviously but it wasn’t really for me. Some lads really thrive on that but it never really interested me all that much.”
Connolly – who turns 36 next week – is speaking at a sponsored event alongside his old sparring partner, former Mayo defender Lee Keegan. Given how fiercely intense their battles on the pitch were, it’s almost jarring to see the two chat and pose for photographs, yet the two men have both been quick to talk each other up since they stepped away from the intercounty stage.
Keegan has previously described Connolly as his toughest opponent. When the same question is put to the Dublin man, he opts for Vincent’s clubmate Ger Brennan. Still, he makes his respect for Keegan clear, adding that he always found the Mayo man’s all-action approach to man-marking posed more of a challenge than the defenders who tried to get in his head.
“We never had a verbal conversation on the field,” Connolly says of Keegan.
“I don’t think that’s his nature though, he was more of a physical, hands-on sort of player, he wasn’t a guy that was in your ear.
I did mark players, a few of the Donegal lads down the years, that would be in your ear more so than being physical, trying to get in your head, but Lee was never like that.
“Both of them (approaches) had their challenges to be fair, but what Lee did was way more effective than what other players did. Like, if you’re just talking in my ear and I’m getting the better of you, you’re not getting in. Whereas if I’m not playing well and you’re in my ear, well then that can curtail you a little bit. But he was never like that.”
Connolly looks at the current game and admits the focus on possession-based football doesn’t exactly get his pulse racing. He hopes Dublin can get the balance right against a Mayo side who have struggled for scores across the summer.
“Dublin traditionally kick the ball, we are not seeing much of that now, it’s all possession-based stuff. I don’t like that, it’s not the way I like playing football, it’s not the way Vincent’s play football and it’s not the way Dublin played football when I was playing.
“We did play it in periods, you have to be able to play like that, but that is not your go-to from the start. We see Donegal, they started it, and we see where that’s got them!
“I’d love to see Dublin kick the ball a little bit more and I think they have the inside forwards to win the ball inside. When Mayo do it they are very good, when Kerry do it they are very good, but you can’t do it all the time. You have to pick and choose your moments.”
The Dublin-Mayo rivalry has entered a new stage now. In the summer of 2021, Mayo finally ended their long championship hoodoo against the Dubs. They haven’t met in the championship since. On Sunday, one of them will see their summer ended at Croke Park.
The game arrives at an intriguing time for both sides. There is a feeling Dublin are a little uncooked given their path to this stage. Mayo are more battle-hardened but look far from the finished product.
“We saw what happened with Mayo in Killarney,” Connolly adds. “Kerry went toe-to-toe with them, it was pure chaos for 10 or 15 minutes and that’s where Mayo thrive. They always have thrived in those situations.
“But I think where they struggle is when they play the likes of Cork and Louth, who are both very structured, and they struggled for long periods against them. They didn’t get their scores off as free-flowing as they usually do. And I think Dublin won’t let that happen.
“I don’t think Dublin are going to come out and play man-on-man with these on Sunday. They might do it for periods of the game but I certainly don’t think they’re going to do it from the start. If Mayo get a good start on Dublin and we’re chasing the game, that could put us in a right hard spot to get back. Mayo love chaos and Dublin love structure, so I suppose it’s a battle of the two.”
A battle Connolly is now happy to watch from a distance.
Diarmuid Connolly & Lee Keegan took part in an ‘Epic Conversation’ for BoyleSports. BoyleSports is offering ‘Epic Odds’ on the match – 6/4 Dublin, 11/4 Mayo.
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