GERARD O’KANE: Memories to last a lifetime

AS we move closer to Christmas Day and the temperature is starting to fall, the average temperature is around ‘Two Degrees’……or so it was in Glenullin last Monday.

Even though it’s 11 days since my own club’s victory in the Ulster Intermediate Championship final and I usually try to look forward in my columns, I am going to be a bit selfish on this occasion. If nothing else, it gives people a small window into what it is like for a club to have a victory at the provincial level.

In the lead up to the game, you do let your mind wander and imagine what winning would be like, but the one thing that can’t be planned for is the actual feeling of winning. You can’t replicate the actual physiological release of endorphins and dopamine that run through your body when the game is over.

So in essence, what you plan for and what you think you might feel is nowhere near what you actually do feel.

For the players themselves, and I know this first-hand from my own experiences and from speaking to them, the first feeling is relief.

There is a measure of truth to the theory that you don’t actually enjoy the game itself but rather the outcome. Whether favourites or underdogs, players put pressure on themselves to be the best on any given day.

Thankfully for Glenullin, our lads saved their best 60-minute performance of the season for the final. I was actually about to write ‘luckily’ instead of ‘thankfully’, but what I would have meant is that, yes there can be an element of luck attached to any game, but when a team is repeatedly doing the right things, making the right decisions, executing the skills and playing with a degree of confidence even when three or four points behind, there is more than luck attached to that.

At the risk of sounding clichéd, that comes from years of working on the basics in both perfect and tough conditions. It’s also about building up a mental resilience that if they do go a few points behind they don’t wilt.

For some quarters to suggest that Glenullin got ‘lucky’ on the day with the conditions as they were playing with lads in around the 40-mark is laughable. I would argue that every team needs lads of that vintage and experience.

Take a look at Scotstown on Sunday (I am in no way comparing Glenullin to Scotstown footballing- wise), and it’s doubtful that they’d have won the game without a 38-year-old Darren Hughes, 36-year-old Damien McArdle and a 34-year-old Kieran Hughes. It’s only when you have that sort of experience in your side that you appreciate the value they bring, not to mention their actual footballing ability.

The euphoric feeling at the final whistle and the on-pitch celebrations only last for those 10 to 15 minutes, but if someone could bottle that feeling and sell it, they would be a millionaire 100 times over.

Then as all that subsides, there is a giddy excitement on the way home from the game. The journey home feels so much shorter than the one to the game.

There’s a quick stop for a pint at the team hotel and giving the players their own space for an hour is important. They deserve their own space in the team environment where they eat as over the next 48 hours, that group won’t get together properly again. It also gives the players time to take in what has just happened, switch off and decompress.

As the whole community made their way back to Glenullin waiting on the team bus, the next 36 hours were as perfect as we could have wished for.

From the youngest people of just a few months old to Annie Bradley, who had eight grandchildren involved in the squad, everyone wanted to be there to welcome home the local heroes.

A short fireworks display led the lads down the hill and the community centre was packed and gave them the welcome home they deserved. Hypothetical I know, but if the result had not gone our way, I would like to think the same turnout of people would still have been there as it’s what the lads deserved. Our committee thought of everything over the next few days to allow everyone to enjoy the occasion.

We have been lucky enough to have a few Monday clubs over the last few years but this one definitely topped the list. There is no upper or lower age limit to people who can enjoy themselves, and a few people from neighbouring clubs came over and were made to feel as welcome as if they lived in Glenullin all their lives.

To finish off the evening we had the Two Degrees playing the evening out. However they have done it, they have marketed themselves as the band for Monday clubs in the Derry, Tyrone, Antrim, Armagh region and they did not disappoint. Two young lads involved in the GAA and can get the pitch of the session just right.

And just like that, it was over. Back to routine. The two days really flew by and it would be great if someone had taken a timelapse of the few days just to watch it back.

The players themselves have an All-Ireland semi-final in January to look forward to, so it’s back to the grindstone for them. It will be a quiet Christmas but not sure I would even call that a sacrifice – instead it’s a privilege to be lining out for your club in the All-Ireland series.