St Loman’s strength in depth may be the decisive factor

Ahead of Sunday’s Westmeath senior football decider, St Loman’s, Mullingar captain John Heslin has expressed the view that strength in depth could prove crucial to the outcome.

Heslin and his team mates are preparing for their ninth senior final in succession, a truly phenomenal achievement, and the Westmeath star believes that they have maintained their focus and desire by continually freshening up the panel.

“When I started playing many years ago it was all about being on the starting 15, but nowadays it is about being on the panel and the panel is now so strong. The lads coming on are the guys going to finish the game and be on the pitch at the final whistle, so nowadays they are arguably the most important people on the team,” he remarked.

“A strong bench is one thing, but a hungry bench and lads who want to drive it on is another and hopefully we can bring that with us on Sunday.”

Manager Paddy Dowdall had the luxury of calling on the likes of TJ Cox in the semi-final and the livewire forward’s late goal put the seal on an emphatic victory over a Tyrrellspass side many felt could really test the Mullingar men. Heslin credits Dowdall’s influence as being key to how the season has progressed.

“We have had great turnouts at training, so well done to Paddy Dowdall on that. People think that because we are based in the town we would automatically have great numbers at training, but that has not always been the case over the years; lads have different interests,” he remarked.

“This year we have huge turnouts at training, including the young lads, so we are in the junior and senior finals this coming weekend and it is great for the club and great for everyone involved.”

While they are being installed as raging hot favourites, Heslin is acutely aware of the pitfalls against a well-balanced Coralstown/Kinnegad side and he expects Paschal Kellaghan and Jack Cooney will have a plan to stop St Loman’s in their tracks.

“I don’t expect to be able to play open and expansive football against a team that Jack Cooney and Paschal Kellaghan are managing. They will be organised and that is an inter-county managerial set up. They are very experienced managers and they have Kinnegad well drilled and they have great footballers, so we are expecting a huge test and a huge battle,” he opined.

“Ultimately, they are the in-form team of the championship. They have won the league, we couldn’t beat them in the group stages, so we will have it all to do next Sunday.”

Heslin and his colleagues have been fiercely determined to win back the trophy after it was ripped from their grasp by The Downs in last year’s decider. Learning from that experience has been key, he suggests.

“Hurt is one thing, but if you sit and dwell on it and don’t learn from it then it is largely irrelevant. Hopefully we have learned the lessons. Looking back at the final, some people might disagree, but we played quite well on the day, just some decisions could have been better and made a difference on the day,” he remarked.

“Hopefully we can rectify that on Sunday. This will be a completely different game and a completely different opposition, so to one extent, last year’s final is irrelevant, but better decisions and learnings will hopefully mean lads can produce more this Sunday.”

Meanwhile, Coralstown/Kinnegad are in upbeat mood ahead of their first senior final in 25 years. Jack Cooney was part of the side that won in 1996 and they went on to contest the next two finals in what were heady days for the proud club.

Now Cooney is overseeing the development of a new crop of players who are capable of taking the club back to the top of Westmeath football. He feels the pressure is off after a year of undoubted progress for a young side.

“We are under no illusion whatsoever about the challenge ahead, but there's loads of ways of measuring success. If it was all down to measuring success on winning a trophy, there would be an awful lot of clubs who are doing an awful lot of good things that would be deemed not successful or failures, so I think you must put things into perspective,” he opined.

“We’ve made a lot of really good progress this year and I think we reflect and measure ourselves on that more so than on lifting silverware.”

Sunday’s final (2.15pm) is sure to attract a big crowd to TEG Cusack Park and it will also be shown live on TG4.