WHEN PETER CREEDON took the reins as Tipperary senior football manager, he set his sights on recruiting one of the county’s hurlers to the fold.

John Coghlan, an All-Ireland U21 hurling medallist in 2010, graduated to Declan Ryan’s senior hurling squad for the following two seasons.

Yet after seeing Coghlan get restricted game time with the county hurlers, Creedon moved to draft him in with the footballers.

“Once I took over I kept ringing and ringing John and he was honest enough to admit that he was down the pecking order with the hurlers,” says Creedon.

“He’s living in Thurles and is a primary school teacher in Roscrea so it suits him. He’s a big addition to us.”

Coghlan’s football pedigree was sound. While he has All-Ireland hurling medals at minor (2007) and U21 (2010), he was part of the Tipperary side that claimed a historic first Munster U21 football title  three years ago against Kerry, prevailing by a narrow 1-7 to 1-6 margin in Tralee.

Tipperary celebrate their 2010 Munster U21 title win.
Pic: INPHO/James Crombie

Robbie Kiely, Ciaran McDonald, Peter Acheson, Alan Maloney and Conor Sweeney all started on that side and were part of the senior setup that reached the round four of All-Ireland qualifiers last summer.

Now Coghlan, a brother of senior panelist Hugh, joins them in defence. That U21 triumph was particularly satisfying for him as he had suffered provincial final defeats in the grade in 2007, 2008 and 2009 before claiming the honours at the fourth attempt.

“John is a very solid player and is playing really well,” says Creedon. “It probably took him 5 or 6 matches to settle back into playing football at a high level again. He’s a big strong man and a very good man marker.”