Goal hero McKay in the face of another battle back

Aaron McKay scored Armagh’s crucial All-Ireland final goal last summer but has yet to play a minute in 2025. One of the players who struggled in the Division Three days, he knows what battling back is all about. Michael McMullan writes…

WHILE Armagh’s story of persistence turns up Church Hill in Clones on Saturday afternoon, Aaron McKay is writing another chapter of his own.

He hasn’t kicked a county ball since the last Sunday of July when his goal shot the Orchard County to Sam Maguire glory last season.

The cartilage in his hip and a bit of osteitis pubis began to send him a warning message as last year’s Ulster final ticked into extra time.

A combination of stubbornness and managing the pain saw him get to the steps of the Hogan Stand.

He tried to plough on, but the operation eight weeks ago came calling. He clings to the hopes Saturday is his last day looking in. The group stage is the new target.

McKay’s pinkie finger still won’t straighten. The tendon ripped off during the All-Ireland quarter-final is still in limbo. Tape ‘er up and truck on.

Beyond the well-versed hard luck stories of four doses of penalty shootout hell, Armagh have a history of persistence.

Enough of the clubs in the county backed manager Kieran McGeeney in a vote that kept him in the job.

Is it any wonder McKay laid his cards out on social media on the All-Ireland night. A photo of Sam Maguire on the grass at the front of the Hogan stand with two words – Geezer Out. A tongue and cheek dig at those who felt McGeeney was there too long. He backed the players and they reciprocated.

#Geezerout pic.twitter.com/M1jyLrfYaf

— Aaron McKay (@AMcKay95) July 28, 2024

Rewind the clock back to the final day of Division Three in 2017. Tipperary came to the Athletic Grounds. A draw would’ve been enough to secure promotion.

Points from Oisin O’Neill and Jamie Clarke had Armagh in a winning position before a third Michael Quinlivan goal tore their season to the damp course.

Nine of the starting team that day played in last summer’s All-Ireland final. Nine.

One of them was Aaron McKay. In his debut season, he held Conor Sweeney, nominated for an All-Star the previous season, to a point from play.

“That was a low day,” McKay said. Not once, but twice. Wearing one of those deep-thinking faces. “That’s how long the journey has been.”

He goes back to the year before. Cavan sent them packing by eight points in Ulster. After losing to Laois in the Qualifiers, an appeal was lodged over an extra sub being used. Armagh were granted a replay. They lost, again.

“The running joke at that time was we were the first team then to be beat three times in championship football.

“Some of the young bucks coming in now, I don’t be long in reminding them it wasn’t always like this,” he said, referring to a consistent knocking on glory’s door.

Even then, McGeeney was “banging the drum” and talking about winning an All-Ireland.

“You’re obviously really looking at yourself being miles away from where you need to be,” McKay recalls.

“Dublin, at that time, were at the peak of their powers but ‘Geezer’ was always adamant to stick with it.

“There were fellas who probably just couldn’t commit and maybe lost a sense of drive to stick with it.

“A core group of lads didn’t. We kept getting one or two new fellas in every year who jumped on the bandwagon and just kept putting the shoulder to the wheel. Thankfully, last year, it was worth it.”

MISSED CHANCE…Dejection for Armagh after a final day home defeat to Tipperary ended their 2017 promotion hopes from Division Three

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From the team who couldn’t win tight games, Armagh are now making a habit of finding the extra something to pull themselves over the line.

Hitting three points to see off Tyrone, taking them to Clones on Saturday, the latest example.

While many didn’t give them a chance against Kerry in the semi-final last season, it was a victory that changed how those on the outside viewed them.

A landmark moment? McKay agrees to a degree before offering some extra meaning from someone inside the camp.

Every team can reach for the reset button after the provincial series. Square one as such. In the past, they’d failed at the quarter-final stage. In 2024, Armagh were one step further. Beating Roscommon was another box ticked.

It was time to take on the Kingdom. The aristocrats. McKay vividly remembers Armagh’s in-house games. Dog eat dog and one before the Kerry game in particular.

“The B team, if you want to call it, whacked the A team,” McKay said of their humbling by the region of 10 points.

“I remember coming home asking how we were going to beat David Clifford and the boys here when our own boys are chinning us.”

He dug deeper. It told more about what they had around the edges. Men chomping for minutes. Real impact men.

“If they were playing a stormer the week before against us,” McKay points out, “you know that they’re at the pitch of it. You know they’re going to make an impact like”

He refers to Tomás McCormack giving Rory Grugan his fill of it in training last year. Fast forward and he is a regular and able to slot in on Ruairi Canavan.

“I knew he was fit to do that at that level,” said McKay, knowing about life in the defensive firing line.

“Nationally, people wouldn’t respect him as much or have known as much about him, but, in-house, we knew he was well fit to do the job.”

It was the same for Callum O’Neill. He has kicked 0-7 in his first two championship games and will take some shifting from a starting berth.

Last year, he was one of the players outside of the matchday squads, yet totally zoned in. He’d know the kick-out calls like everyone else. A sponge.

Now he’s getting his time. McKay hopes this week to push to for his. It’s about putting his hand up.

Desperate not to be tagged as one of the old brigade in the Armagh dressing room, McKay clings to the fact he hasn’t turned 30. He lists the old guard with a devious smile. But there is a respect.

“Those boys were knocking on the door even back when we were in Division Three,” McKay said of the experienced core.

“They were slugging it out when there were only maybe 500 people at a match. So, even some of us, younger lads, want them to win Ulster.”

McKay was hammering the perplex roof on the Clones dugout when Conor Turbitt won the winning free against Tyrone.

He’ll be more nervous as he looks on at the throngs of fans as the bus snakes through Clones than his relaxed nature heading to last July’s All-Ireland final.

He’s a bad passenger but he hopes the bus will have an extra passenger on the way home. A silver one. Unfinished business? You could say that.

Check this week’s preview show as former county stars Charlie Vernon and Rory Kavanagh look ahead to Saturday’s Ulster final showdown in Clones.