Leinster regrets linger for Cian O’Sullivan

At the end of his worst week of the year, you’d almost feel some sympathy for Cian O’Sullivan. Even with his six All-Irelands.

Responsible for the penalty that allowed Mullinalaghta to steal a fairytale Leinster club title last Sunday, and subsequently sent off, it’s not been an easy few days for the Kilmacud Crokes defender.

And in a funny sort of way, defeat probably hits the 30-year-old harder than most, simply because the Dublin great has so rarely experienced it.

Then you inform him that the heroes of Mullinalaghta will recount their remarkable tale on The Late, Late Show tonight.

“Thanks for the heads up,” smiled O’Sullivan, confiding that he’ll be sure to avoid that channel.

He won’t be hiding from the loss though and admitted he’s come around to a grudging acceptance that the tiny half-parish club of Mullinalaghta did something truly special last Sunday.

“I appreciate it’s a fantastic thing they’ve done,” he said. “But it is difficult, it’s like after any final you lose with any team, you’re fragile. We stuck with the group on Sunday night and on the Monday a few of us met up again.

And we wouldn’t take a thing from Mullinalaghta, it’s an incredible thing they’ve done; winning three Longfords in a row and now winning Leinster as well. All credit to them. It is a fantastic story and it’s something that as the days have passed, I’ve been able to appreciate a bit more.

“But we’re also footballers, we’re competitive, we want to go out there and win. So from our perspective, that’s all we were focused on last Sunday. So not doing that was very, very disappointing.”

By now, the statistics associated with Mullinalaghta’s win are well-known; smallest club in one of Ireland’s smallest counties, 447 local residents, no jersey sponsor.

It has all the ingredients of a story to tell the grandkids about — though O’Sullivan might leave out the bit about fouling Aidan McElligott for the decisive penalty, or he might claim it was a soft call.

There was also some confusion over whether James McGivney, the Longford player who starred for Mullinalaghta, actually left the field immediately after his dismissal in stoppage time.

“I didn’t actually notice that at all,” O’Sullivan said of the McGivney issue. “You see, this is the danger whenever you lose big games....I remember a manager in the past gave us some great advice after losing a big game with the Dublin team; he pulled everyone in and said: ‘When you go out this evening, you’re guaranteed to look for excuses and to look for decisions that were made in the game and there are 100 things guys could pick out in their mind - if this or that went this way we wouldn’t have lost the game and you’ll point the finger elsewhere’.

But he said: ‘If you’re actually to take something away from this, the only thing you can do is look inward at yourselves as a group and question what could we have done different to make sure that result wasn’t what it was’. That’s the only way you really grow from an experience like that.

“So you could look at little things like that and stuff but that’s not going to change the result and you’re not going to take anything from it so I try to avoid doing that as much as I can.”

Instead, O’Sullivan will file the Mullinalaghta experience away to a small folder marked ‘learning experiences’.

“Looking back on some of the days being involved with Dublin when we were beaten, like by Meath in Leinster in 2010 and by Donegal in the 2014 All-Ireland, you learn so much from them and they were key moments in the journey this Dublin team has been on for the last couple of years,” he said. “From my perspective, I was looking afterward at that game on Sunday and thinking hopefully it will be a key point for us over the next couple of years, likes those games were for Dublin.”

The big positive for O’Sullivan, who turns 31 in March and getting married next week, is that approaching Dublin’s most important season ever, he can now take some much needed time out.

Not that he’s overly interested in doing so.

“There’ll be massive competition for places so getting back in there and playing games is going to be the focus for everyone,” he said.

- More than 130 GOAL Miles will take place nationwide this Christmas. For more information and for a list of venues see goalmile.org