O’Connor aiming to halt personal Athletic Grounds hoodoo

By Shaun Casey

PAUL O’Connor has been involved in plenty of big days at the BOX-IT Athletic Grounds, but getting over the line in a final is an itch he’s aiming to scratch this Wednesday evening.

O’Connor led Ballymacnab to back-to-back Armagh SFC county finals in 2018 and 2019 alongside Bernie Murray, but came unstuck against Crossmaglen on both occasions.

He’s been involved with plenty of Monaghan underage teams down through the years as well, and when it comes to finals in the Athletic Grounds, he has yet to get over the line.

His Monaghan u-20 team are hoping to dethrone Ulster and All-Ireland champions Tyrone at the Cathedral City venue and pick up their first provincial title at this grade in a decade.

Monaghan were extremely impressive against Armagh in their semi-final win, while Tyrone came from seven-points behind to beat Donegal on the other side of the draw.

O’Connor delighted with improving squad depth as Monaghan reach u-20 decider

“I’ve had plenty of finals in here [Armagh],” O’Connor explained. “I lost two county finals with Ballymacnab here and two Ulster finals, u-20 and minor and an All-Ireland final here too but it’s a brilliant stadium to come and play in.

“It’s where everybody wants to be playing. I told the boys all week that there’s nowhere else you’d rather be playing than in the Athletic Grounds with a big crowd and a good pitch.

“You want to pit your wits against the best players and obviously Tyrone are going to bring that, so we’ll be looking forward to getting back to the Athletic Grounds to hopefully see the job out.”

Tyrone have been the standard setters across Ireland at underage for the last couple of years, bringing home All-Ireland titles at minor and u-20 level last season.

Three years ago, when the Monaghan minors reached the Ulster and All-Ireland finals but came up second best against Derry twice, they needed a penalty shootout win over the Red Hand County to reach the provincial decider.

“The manner of that result was great – we were five down with five to go and we kicked a couple of great scores to get ourselves into extra time,” O’Connor recalled of that 2023 meeting when he coached the team under Dermot Malone.

“We’re looking forward to the challenge that Tyrone will bring. We obviously know what they’re going to bring and we know the pedigree that they have at underage level but we have that too.

“I’m not surprised that the two teams from the quarter-finals built a bit of momentum, I think that does work in our favour at underage level, albeit it’s tough.

“We’ve been six weeks on the road but we know we’re building and that word momentum. Once you start to build it, it’s hard to stop.

“We’ve won a semi-final but we have no silverware. This group had no silverware back in 2023, lost in two finals and probably a disappointing performance in the All-Ireland final, Derry were a very strong team.

“We have to go out on Wednesday and produce a performance that’s going to get us silverware and ultimately that’s what it’s about.”