Returning Dempsey in it for the long haul

CARLOW have known plenty of false dawns. It was a wonder Éire Óg could dominate the club scene in Leinster, agonisingly close to All-Ireland glory, and yet the county team would fail to function.

The man who inspired Éire Óg, the late Bobby Miller, subsequently took over the reins with the county team but failed to find the spark after a promising start. Other managers who began well were Mickser Condon, Liam Hayes and Paul Bealin, but Carlow soon returned to drowning in a sea of recriminations.

The common thread has been the list of players making themselves unavailable for selection. Given that history, one reckoned that Luke Dempsey had gotten it right by coming in on a caretaker basis in 2004 after Condon’s departure and overseeing a famous championship win over Longford. Following a battling loss to Laois, the hero rode off into the sunset for Longford and we thought, ‘clever man’. A seed had been sown though. A native of Kildare, Dempsey lived in Carlow for a decade after his 10th birthday. He had strong links with Ballinabranna and Carlow CBS, and played at minor, U21 and senior level for the county.

So when he removed himself from the race for the job as Meath manager, he was persuaded by Carlow chairman Pat Deering to return home and set about rebuilding the fortunes of the senior footballers. It would have been billed as one of the most unattractive jobs on the inter-county circuit. The difficulty of the task at hand has come as no surprise.

“From knowing the way Carlow had gone since I was there in 2004, I always knew it was going to be a tough job and I wanted that challenge,” admitted Dempsey.

“It took a while to get to know the lads because we couldn’t start until January and it was March before we could get a panel sorted out. Now we have a panel but it’s going to take a lot longer to get things right.”

This is key. Dempsey is in this for the long haul.

“Over the last few months we have worked hard to get the lads committed to the cause, convincing them that if they work at it, it will pay off. So you can’t leave it in mid-air.”

The pattern of players not willing to commit remains though. Dempsey has criticised Thomas Walsh heavily for his dalliance with Wicklow but there are plenty of others. So how do you cure such a debilitating disease?

“You just have to keep working hard at making it appealing to play for Carlow, with good, organised, professional training. The set-up has to be right. And then, you have to get results. It’s up to the manager to make sure everything is right.”

The league began poorly but then Dempsey was coming in cold. One feared for his unrelenting optimistic attitude to life but a battling performance against Sligo was followed by two wins and then victory in a challenge against in-form Tipp means that the mood couldn’t be better. We got four points out of our last two matches in the league. One of them was against Kilkenny but the lads dug in well against Wicklow, who needed to win as well so it wasn’t as if they weren’t at full steam. That was pleasing.

“From mid-March to the present time, the lads have prepared as well as any group I’ve ever been with. They’ve really put their shoulders to the wheel.”

A broken collar-bone has ruled Alan Curran out and Dempsey is giving championship debuts to defenders Shane Myers, Ciarán Nolan, Seán Gannon and Shane Redmond. Louth are odds-on favourites, something Dempsey acknowledges as correct.

“Louth are very strong and I would probably prefer to be playing Wicklow, Longford or even Wexford for that matter but there are no easy games in Leinster these days.

“We’ll be judged by our performance tomorrow. What I look for is for a player to play his best. For me at the moment it’s performance-related rather than results. If we get the performances right consistently, the results will come.”