Longford SFC Final: Mickey Harkin the mastermind in guiding Colmcille to glory
Peter Hanley Motors Senior Football Championship Final
While the St Mary’s Granard clubman only took over this season, he told The Leader that he started working with some of the Colmcille players 16 years ago.
“I trained some of the lads at underage. My son Ruairi and some of the others, I took them up to U-10's. So, the hard work started 16 years ago,” he explained.
There was plenty of hard work on display from Colmcille on the day as well. In his first year in charge, Harkin admits he wasn’t expecting Sean Connolly to visit so soon.
“I thought maybe the second year we might compete for the title, but not this year. A lot of teams have aspirations to lift the Connolly Cup. Only one team can do it,” he stated.
He credits a “change in mentality” with the players as being instrumental.
“We sought to change the culture this year. We also made a number of big decisions. One of them was to put Noel Farrell in goals. Noel is a good kicker of the ball and had years of county experience.
“Another decision was to make Jack Macken captain. We saw something different in Jack, a maturity. He was also key to our culture change,” the manager explained.
“It was about being ahead at the final whistle. We hung in there,” he added.
Harkin went on to talk about the work rate and honesty expected of a Colmcille player.
“If you don’t work hard enough and you don’t play well enough, we will take you off,” he stated bluntly.
He also praised the efforts of the returning Barry McKeon. “We were delighted to start Barry and he had a fantastic game,” he commented.
Harkin is now looking forward to a Leinster Championship game against the Louth champions after beating Mullinalaghta.
“We will get back at it this week. We aim to take Leinster very seriously and we will look at the Louth final replay this weekend,” he remarked.
Jubilant Colmcille manager Mickey Harkin celebrating the dramatic win at the final whistle with fellow mentor Paul Treacy while the disappointed Mullinalaghta St Columba's manager Ciaran Fox is pictured in the background Photo: Syl Healy