Diarmuid Connolly: the GAA’s last quiet man steps up to the mic

First Stephen Cluxton, then Ciarán McDonald and now Diarmuid Connolly; no longer is there a hiding place within the GAA for the reclusive football star.

Cluxton — who inspired both Dublin and Ireland to famous wins over the years without uttering a single word to the press — finally ended a self-imposed vow of silence when he was named Dublin captain in 2013.

More recently, Mayo’s great footballing enigma, McDonald, popped up on on the Second Captains TV show. Nobody could recall him ever staring into a television camera before.

Perhaps encouraged by that spirit of abandon, similarly gifted playmaker Connolly finally placed himself before the media yesterday for full scrutiny.

The occasion was the launch of Dublin’s SFC and Connolly, a little like Tiger Woods at the Masters last week, found himself flanked by twice the number of journalists as any other player. After a little dancing around the issue, a composed Connolly was asked why, after two All-Ireland wins, an All-Star and a multitude of offers to deal with the media, he finally relented.

“I’ve been asked to be club captain of St Vincent’s this year so I was conscious I wanted to promote Vincent’s in the right light today with the launch of the Dublin championships,” explained Connolly.“I try and help out the club if at all possible. We were only down there a couple of Saturdays ago giving out Easter eggs to the kids. 200, 250 kids down there on a Saturday morning. Trying to get into the car park myself was a bit of a disaster!

“As a player, you don’t have too much time to give in that capacity but it is something I will probably look at in the future, take on a younger side maybe and develop the younger lads.”

Up close, the hot-headed caricature of Connolly that has been built over the years, from issues both on and off the field, was shot to pieces. With the eyes of a room trained upon him, he even cracked a joke or two.

Like when it was suggested to him that his near miss when going for goal against Donegal in the first-half of last year’s All-Ireland semi-final was the turning point of a famous game.

“Thanks for that!” he shot back, lowering his head in his hands for a moment. “A lot of things happened in that game that could have been different but weren’t. It was a good save at the time. I probably should have put it in the right hand corner rather than going across the ‘keeper but it’s not something that haunts me.

“I think we were winning the game at that point anyway so in my opinion it wasn’t a major turning point. The two goals they got after half-time were.”

Now 27, Connolly has grown into a leader in the Dublin team, their silent assassin as last year’s nomination for Player of the Year attests. His improvement and investment in himself has been rewarded with the vice captaincy. It’s not stretching plausibility to suggest he could follow Cluxton as an All-Ireland-winning captain.

The immediate target is a third national league winners’ medal, in a row. Dublin play Cork on Sunday week though if they win Connolly is adamant the riches won’t ever inflate his ego.

“No, just try to be humble in victory and defeat,” he maintained. “But go out to win every game at the same time.”