Conroy: Time to stand up and be counted
When your career starts, all you can see are the lovely roses of potential success. However, as the seasons skip by, the thorns on the bushes leave their mark.
Conroy was Galway’s much heralded All-Ireland minor winning captain in 2007. The following year Liam Sammon started him at midfield and he won his first, and only, senior provincial medal.
That August, he went up against Darragh Ó Sé and Seamus Scanlon as Galway went down by five to Kerry in the legendary Saturday night monsoon at Croke Park. It was a baptism of fire and despite that defeat, with U21 successes from 2002, 2005, and the minor win in 2007, the future looked bright.
It proved to be a false dawn, however. Those successes were not built on and it has been downhill since.
Mayo on Sunday provides another chance to kickstart an inter-county career that has stalled. Conroy knows time is moving on and does not want an inter-county career of regrets.
“[After the Kerry game] I was hopeful Galway would be coming out of Connacht on a regular basis. However, that has not happened and our record in the qualifiers has been abysmal,” he said.
“Mayo have won three out of the last four Connacht titles and have been by far the best and most consistent team in Connacht.
“Our objective is to try and stop them jumping the first fence for a possible three in-a-row of Connacht titles. I have no doubt Mayo will be looking to try and go one better than last season.”
While Conroy made his name at underage level as a top midfielder, he has been utilised as a full-forward and wing-forward by Alan Mulholland over the past two seasons.
“To be honest, I don’t mind where I play. Full-forward took a bit of getting used to, but I am enjoying it there now and once I can do a job for the team I am happy enough. Fiontán Ó Curraoin, Niall Coleman, Tom Flynn, Anthony Griffin, Greg Higgins and a few others are vying for the midfield spots, so while it may be a cliché, I am happy to play anywhere once we are making progress and improving.”
After suffering six one-point defeats in the championship and qualifiers in the past four years, Conroy acknowledges he and some of the other more senior players really need to put their shoulders to the wheel.
“The facts don’t lie and we have been beaten by a single point far too often in the championship since we lost the Connacht final to Mayo back in 2009. Since then unfortunately, we have always come out on the wrong side of tight games. And yes, our job is to try and change that. To be honest, we have no interest in looking backwards at the past and next Sunday is all we are focusing on.
“Mayo are a very fine team. They are a seasoned outfit that collected four or five All Stars last year and we will have to produce a top-class performance to beat them. They are coming to Pearse Stadium which is a plus for us and the U21s winning the All-Ireland final has also given us a boost.
“Some of those guys are really fine young players and watching them doing so well against Cork was great to see. The county has won two out of the last three U21 titles, so hopefully we can build on those wins.
“It stirs the pot of ambition and we know if we can get by Mayo, the season opens up and gives us a fighting shot at winning a provincial title. However, we are taking it one game at a time, and we are not looking at anything but Mayo at 4pm next Sunday.”
Outside of football he has other things occupying his mind. Emigration, for example. He’s studying for his final exams as part of the Graduate Diploma in Education at UL. After a four-year business degree in GMIT, he spent two years working as an SNA in his alma mater, St Mary’s College, and hopes to get a job teaching business and Irish next September somewhere.
“A lot of my class have already sourced teaching jobs in England, Dubai and the UAE for next year. I would love to stay in Ireland for work and football with Galway and St James. However, you have to be realistic and you need to be working.
“Over half my class of 50 expect to have to go away for work this September. With the economic downturn and the way things have gone in teaching, young teachers have no option but to do that. It is not ideal, but what choice do people have?”
At least those decisions are a few months away. For now, all thoughts are on Sunday’s game and before he leaves, Conroy sizes up the task they face.
“Mayo were the second best team in Ireland last year and held their own in Division 1 this year too. They beat Dublin in the All-Ireland semi-final by three points and with a bit of luck could have taken Donegal.
“We got well beaten by Sligo and then by Antrim in the qualifiers. So it is pretty obvious why they are hot favourites. They deserve to be.”
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