Keane hoping Westmeath remember Páidí’s wise words

Within a Páidí Ó Sé-managed team, there was another team — the defenders.

John Keane remembers how he built up the Westmeath back-line to take on Dublin in their famous 2004 Leinster quarter-final. With the cuckoo came the cut, lean version of PÓ but followed by a sniff of Dublin in his nostril appeared a man three inches taller.

“There was a glare in his eye and a determination in his voice,” recalls Keane. “He promised us something special was going to happen and this was an opportunity that wasn’t going to come around very often. He was right on that, it hasn’t come since then.

“The way he was able to speak to us, especially the defence, was magical. He had this special bond with the defenders. He’d describe the forwards, whether they be ours or another team’s, as a lazy shower of hoors.

“He was able to bind the defenders and convince us that we were the ones that were going to win the game. He didn’t have a defensive strategy but just emphasised work-rate and getting back and this was before blanket defence.”

After 20 or so minutes and Dublin leading by four points, things weren’t all that pretty but Ó Sé had prepared them for such an eventuality. He’d actually predicted it.

“It looked like we were going to be railroaded but he had told us that the first 20 minutes were going to be tough, Dublin would have a purple patch and it was just about hanging in.

“I was only 23 in the full-back line and we were getting a bit of a doing early on but I vividly remember Damien Healy gathering us all together and reminding us that Páidí had told us this would happen. He had an incredible knack of having us right for such events.”

Ó Sé’s presence in the dressing room also helped Westmeath to ignore Dublin’s long shadows and instead focus on those who cast them.

“He was lucky in a sense that he was dealing with people who had won a minor and an U21 All-Ireland but then there was a huge difference between that and achieving at senior level.

“Being from Kerry, everything he said you believed and he hadn’t the slightest fear of Dublin. He’d huge respect for them but there was no fear, no panic. When he communicated that to us we felt the same. It was down to who wanted it more.”

Keane looks at this evening’s encounter with Dublin as a much more onerous one for Westmeath than nine years ago. Still, he’d love to be part of the Division 2-winning team Pat Flanagan has fashioned together, assembling some of the 2004 stalwarts with those who have emerged from the impressive U21 teams in recent times.

“They’re a superb bunch of lads. A lot of people in Westmeath felt the younger guys should’ve won something at U21 level.

“It would be great if Westmeath were to do something because the whole set-up has been re-energised. I’d be talking to guys like Gary [Connaughton] and Dessie [Dolan] and the excitement is rubbing off on them.”

One of the earliest tell-tale signs that Westmeath were on to something came in last year’s qualifiers when they were so unfortunate not to have beaten Kerry in Mullingar.

Keane feels this season is the first time Flanagan has been able to get everybody assembled and working together.

“Last year was coming after Garrycastle’s involvement in the All-Ireland but Mullingar Shamrocks were knocked out of Leinster in the first round so everybody was able to come back on board.

“They just bought into the whole thing before Christmas and the optimism was there before the league started. They wouldn’t have envisaged topping Division 2 but they had confidence and lads were training hard. For a small county like Westmeath, everything has to be going the same way.”

On John Heslin’s shoulders, plenty will rest but Keane is supremely assured the 20-year-old will be the leader for Westmeath if not today then at a later stage.

“If Westmeath are to have a chance of beating Dublin, Heslin’s going to have to take the game by the scruff of the neck and not allow Michael Darragh Macauley run him around the field.

“His free-taking has been exceptional although he probably hasn’t been doing enough from open play this year. Then again, it’s easy to forgot how young he is. Not many his age are in an inter-county team and capable of dominating a game.

“The experience from Australia will stand to him and I hope he rises for the occasion but the people of Westmeath have to realise that if it doesn’t happen against Dublin, it’ll come again. He’s able for the pressure.”

PÓ’s type of man.