STEPHEN ROCHFORD CUTS a relaxed figure as he sits down for an interview in the hallway of Croke Park’s sixth floor, beside some of the busiest conference rooms at the Drumcondra venue.
Rochford is in town for AIB’s All-Ireland club championships finals media day, where his former club Corofin are bidding to retain their crown against 2017 champions Dr Crokes.
He’s extremely familiar with the Galway kingpins, having led the majority of the current panel to All-Ireland club success in 2015. He was just 36 when he managed Corofin to that victory and was considered one of the brightest young coaches in the game.
The four years since then have passed in the blink of an eye.
His three seasons in charge of Mayo included trips to the All-Ireland final in 2016 and 2017, where they came within a point of Dublin both times.
It’s nearly impossible to have a conversation with a man like Rochford without the four-in-a-row champions cropping up at some point.
For many pundits, those All-Ireland finals were the peak of this Mayo team. Rochford’s side were one of the very few sides who visibly grew in stature when they faced Dublin in the championship.
It was the defining rivalry of this decade and only for two desperately unfortunate own goals in the drawn 2017 decider, Mayo might have delivered Sam Maguire already.
It’s put to Rochford that no manager has come closer than him to beating this Dublin team since their present run began.
“That’s a great label to have,” he laughs self-deprecatingly.
He’s since decamped to Donegal as a coach under Declan Bonner. Along with his very obvious coaching acumen, Rochford’s years of study on the champions have been added to Donegal’s repertoire. While he never managed a victory against Jim Gavin’s side, he has his thoughts on the best way to go about it.
“You have to respect Dublin and the quality they have but you can’t go into your shell about it because they’ll absolutely annihilate you,” he says. “The same as with a soccer team, possession is nine-tenths of the law.
“If you don’t go and look to battle for that ball as much as the opposition, you’re going to find yourself on the back foot. So what you’re really looking to play is the margin of your defeat, not necessarily going to win it. In any of those championship games we played against Dublin it was always with a view to going out and winning the game.
But what we did was we only got as close as that, we still didn’t manage to get over the line, but I do think the gap is closing on that. Will it be this year? Will it be 2020? Time will tell. I think there’s a number of teams that are certainly closing the gap or have the potential to do that.”
With some of the best defenders in the game, Mayo were able to match-up with Dublin man-on-man all over the field in those ’16 and ’17 finals. Without giving away any state secrets, Rochford believes the day of beating Dublin with a blanket defence and swift counter-attack is long gone.
“There’s a number of different facets of it, that’s maybe a bit for the GAA nerd. Dublin are so comfortable in a number of different styles, playing against or playing with themselves.
“And all the details watching them, they have a kick-out strategy – and a lot of other teams will have as well – but theirs is such a winning formula based on their last four years. It becomes so much more distinct.
“So I don’t think you’ll beat Dublin – and I don’t think any team has got inside that six- or eight-point margin – by playing 13 guys behind the ball.
“Because again, you’re giving quality footballers so much time on the ball that they’ll just pick you off. They’ll just isolate where the chink is.
“One of the hardest things in the game is to maintain your level of concentration in those defensive situations. They just go and look to pick you off. I don’t think there is a blueprint to say, ‘This is how you beat them.’
What you’re looking at is it’s a way that presents the best way to challenge them, but until somebody goes and beats them that will them become the way of doing things.”
As he leans back into his chair to expand on his point, Rochford catches the eye of Cathal Cregg as the Roscommon forward walks past us down the hallway.
Cregg, who works as provincial games manager for Connacht GAA, bagged a goal for Roscommon against, incidentally, the Dubs on Sunday afternoon.
“Goal of the weekend!” Rochford directs at Cregg, before returning to his train of thought.
“But to come back to it, Dublin have kept most teams at arm’s length in whatever style they’ve wanted to take them on. That’s how your respect for them grows in the ways they’re not fazed by it.
I think the gap is certainly closing and I don’t know who that will be that’s going to be their closest competitor this year but I think that’s what makes the 2019 season fascinating.
“It’s going to be historic one way or another, it’s going to be a five-in-a-row or it’s going to be the team that dethrones certainly the best team in modern football history. So everyone’s looking forward to it.”
Before we look any further forward, the conversation is steered back to the past. Rochford’s tumultuous exit from the Mayo hot-seat arrived 58 days after they were dumped out of the All-Ireland qualifiers by Kildare.
Less than a fortnight earlier, Rochford had confirmed his intention to stay in charge for a fourth season. But on 27 August, he handed in his resignation over “a lack of support” from the board executive in relation to the new management team he’d put in place.
Just like that, it was all over.
Eamonn Fitzmaurice’s reign as Kerry boss ended early the same month. Following his departure and his revelations about the letters of abuse he received in the post, it sparked off a nationwide debate about the levels of scrutiny and criticism aimed at county managers.
So, just how pressurised a job was being the Mayo manager?
“I certainly would never have looked at it as a draining job,” says Rochford. “If that level of expectation wasn’t there what would it have actually meant in terms of where the team was at? So, with challenging at the top table comes a level of expectation, that’s just the nature of the animal.
The opportunity to represent your club and your county is something that I take very, very personally and strongly. So I never felt burdened by the pressure or the expectation in Mayo.
“I felt very, very honoured to be that person that represented the management. And, look, we had a number of very enjoyable days. And we had a number of days where, yeah, it was disappointing in terms of performances and some days just disappointing with the result having gotten so far. But that’s sport.
“That’s why you saw Limerick absolutely overjoyed last year when they came out the right side of a one-point, close game. And I’ve no doubt that if Mayo come out that side of it or a Donegal or a Kerry in 2019 and stop Dublin getting the five-in-a-row, you’ll see unbridled joy.
That’s why we’re all involved in sport. To dream of those days and to be involved in those potential days anyway.”
Shortly after his resignation, Rochford appeared on Miriam O’Callaghan’s RTÉ Radio 1 programme to discuss his tenure. It led to an uncomfortable situation where O’Callaghan read out texts from listeners to Rochford.
Even bringing Mayo to within touching distance of an All-Ireland title didn’t insulate him from condemnation.
Many commended him on the job he’d done with Mayo, but inevitably some stinging criticism came his way too.
Said one texter: “If he’s struggling to understand why he’s in this position now, playback this interview to him. He won nothing with Mayo, brought in no new players and brought nothing new to the table despite promising the sun, moon and stars. Cop on, Stephen.”
Páidí Ó Sé’s ”the roughest type of f**king animals” comments spring to mind.
“That expectation or that there’s a sort of a hysteria around it probably comes a little bit more from supporters,” says Rochford. “That’s not something we can control.
“There’s a number of different elements to that. Social media now, wider media content and all of that makes the GAA just so much more…it’s a daily part of a paper or an online production or publication.
So you just get on with it. The supporters are very much the fabric of what the GAA is about and I think it would be trying to dampen expectation which is a term, but I think you just sort of expect it and if you’re competing at the top table you understand that expectation is going to come with it.
“Typically the culture of excellence or high performance, that’s what the players and the management or administration can look to control in that sense.
At just 40, there’s no reason Rochford can’t a second-coming with Mayo similar to James Horan at some point down the line. After stepping down in 2014, Horan went away and furthered his coaching acumen.
He stayed plugged into the game with his TV punditry work and undertook a Masters degree in coaching at UCC, while also studying various other sports.
Rochford doesn’t rule out a return to the Mayo job, although it’s not something he sees happening ”in the short or medium term.”
“Look, as a Mayo person I wouldn’t rule that necessarily out,” he says. “But I wouldn’t envisage it happening anytime soon.
“I’m above in Donegal now and I’m really enjoying working with a really energised, ambitious, playing group with a lot of potential there along with a very seasoned and experienced management team.
“It’s the Donegal job that’s my focus now, not sort of bettering myself for another coming in Mayo. It’s not something that’s on my radar in the short or medium term.
“But, look, nobody knows what’s happening or what’s coming around the corner or what things may develop in ten years’ time or something like that. But I don’t see it happening any time soon.”
He has watched Horan’s return to the role with interest from distance. The heavy loss to Dublin at Croke Park last month was the first time Rochford brought his son to see the county play.
“It was an opportunity to bring my young lad to a Mayo game,” he says. “I haven’t had the opportunity to do that previously, funnily enough.
“That was nice, but it wasn’t the result that we were looking for. I saw the game against Roscommon on TV and I watched the game, the Galway game, over the next week or so.
“(I’ve seen) one or two bits on highlights. But, you know, they’ve positioned themselves in a good position. Obviously winning the first three games they had good momentum. That’s come a little bit unstuck in relation to the last two performances.
“But I’ve no doubt they’ll be rallying the troops and getting themselves ready for Tralee (to play Kerry next weekend). I’d expect a higher level of performance, certainly going to Tralee.
“The last time they played in Tralee they won that game, so they’re used to going down there and giving a good, strong performance. We’ll wait and see.”
Some comparisons were drawn between Mayo’s recent 1-12 to 0-7 defeat to the All-Ireland champions and the 1-16 to 0-7 beating Dublin dished out during the 2017 league during Rochford’s reign.
“Certainly in 2017, we were probably only back training in January. So that’s probably why the last day’s performance is a bit more surprising on the back of having won the first three games, there was good momentum gathered.
I think the guys that week would have trained in Dublin. I think they came collectively to Dublin and trained in the week coming up to it and getting a similar surface to Croke Park.
“But Diarmuid (O’Connor), Chris Barrett, Cillian O’Connor – all those guys missing. All important players for that group. They’re all due to come back. Kevin McLoughlin came off the bench that night.
“So they’ve a nice bit of experience and quality still to come into the team. Some of those guys may return for the Kerry game and I’d be expecting them to lift themselves and give a really strong account of themselves in Tralee.”
For now, he’s very content with Donegal. It meant a return to what many consider to be Rochford’s best quality, his coaching on the training field.
Within a couple of months of leaving Mayo, a phone call came from Declan Bonner to gauge his interest in joining his coaching ticket with the Ulster champions.
I didn’t do it within 24 hours. I think people need to remember that it wasn’t a case that I wasn’t committed to being involved with a team. In a planning sense we’d looked that I was going to be involved with a team in 2019.
“I’d said immediately afterwards that I would be involved with a team in 2019 – I didn’t whether that was going to be club or inter-county. But then when a team with the quality and potential that Donegal have and bring, that makes that decision a lot clearer.
“Then it was just looking at the logistic elements of what that were, were they feasible? Plus the position as a coach, it doesn’t have the intensity of what the ask as a manager would have.
“When you’re dealing with media, the county board, medical teams and players. It’s very distinct and you know very much what the expectations of your role is as the coach. In that, I was very happy to make that.
Declan presented a very attractive picture and obviously the vision for his team and the potential that he’d seen close-up. He would have known a lot of these players since minor and U21.
“So bringing all those bits together, probably over a three-week period, a bit of talking and sensing around the opportunity that was there, things came together and the rest is history.”
He confirmed Donegal are expecting star midfielder Odhran MacNiallais back prior to the summer. After Gaoth Dobhair’s exit at the All-Ireland club semi-final stage in February, MacNiallais indicated he’d take some time out of football.
His physical and emotional reserves were empty after losing close friend Micheál Roarty in the tragic Donegal road accident the previous month, but Rochford is looking forward to MacNiallais’s return at some stage over the coming months.
“Himself and Declan would have spoken at the tail end of January around the start of the National League and it was a case that there was no expectation that Odhran was going to immediately return after the club.
But my understanding is that we’ll be seeing him sooner rather than later. The quality player that he is we’ll look forward to having him amongst the ranks, be that for the last two National League games or else the championship preparations for Fermanagh.”
It remains a distinct possibility that Donegal and Mayo will clash in the championship later this season, a prospect Rochford says he hasn’t given much thought to.
“I suppose that’s something that you won’t know until it happens. I wouldn’t like it to be in the back door because I wouldn’t like to be there in the first place.
“If it’s in the Super 8s or a more advanced position, so be it, it means both teams are positioning themselves well.
“So, look, if that materialises, I won’t have a particular problem with it and certainly would look to embrace the opportunity or challenge that it would present at that time.”
If it does transpire, he’ll take it in his stride.
Just like he’s always done.
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