Macauley challenges new Dubs to tear up the script

HOOP DREAMS: Michael Darragh Macauley, centre, with North East Inner City Trojans players, from left, Amirlan Bayanbat, Lorena Iacob, Xinni Chen, Andre Nonai, Louisa da Silva Lucas and Sophie Zhan. Picture: David Fitzgerald/Sportsfile

Former Dublin midfielder Michael Darragh Macauley has challenged the county's newer players to 'tear up the script' and to 'rip the jersey off' the established players' backs.

The ex-Footballer of the Year compared Dublin's current journey through Division 2 to his own breakthrough season of 2010 when the Sky Blues gained traction through the qualifiers following a surprise provincial exit and ended up facing Cork in an All-Ireland semi-final.

A new-look Dublin team went on to win the All-Ireland the following year, the first of eight in 10 seasons, and current manager Dessie Farrell is attempting to build his own dynasty.

Dublin have been criticised for their lukewarm form in Division 2 though Farrell has used 27 different players in four games, and 49 since the start of the O'Byrne Cup.

St Vincent's attacker Sean Lowry made his full league debut against Clare last Saturday and looked lively in the early stages, setting up two scores.

Daire Newcombe was starting his third game in his debut season while Ross McGarry and David O'Hanlon are rookie performers seizing their chances too.

"There really can't be any reliance on old players, what medals anyone has after their name," said Ballyboden St Enda's man Macauley. "And I'm sure that will get talked about in the dressing room, that this is a new team and whatever happened in the past is history, because it is.

"I think the biggest way that is going to get driven on is by new players coming into that dressing room and just not giving a f*** really about who anyone is.

"I see it in Ballyboden at the moment, I want young lads to try to murder me. I'm playing basketball at the moment but when I come back I want some 18-year-old to try to rip the jersey off my back. If I was an 18-year-old coming into the team and I see me at 35 still playing midfield for Ballyboden, I would put an absolute bullseye on my head.

"And that's what that (Dublin) team needs, they need young lads coming in who don't care about egos, don't care about who anybody is, and who are just willing to tear up the script a little bit and bring that bit of fresh blood.

"That will bring out the best in the lads who are there and who have done it all before. That's what you want from some of these new players, not to sit there and clap on the lads who have won whatever they have won."

Eight-time All-Ireland winner Macauley intends to play on with Ballyboden this season.

"We got hockeyed for the last three years in a row, that's the truth of it and if the lads don't think there's a point to prove they'd want to check themselves," he said.

As for Dublin, Macauley expects returning duo Jack McCaffrey and Paul Mannion, both All-Ireland-winning colleagues, to have big impacts this season and to handle the pressure of expectation.

"Those lads are well able for the pressure, there's no problem about that," he said. "But those lads could play a stormer and win All-Stars and Dublin could still maybe not win the All-Ireland, the team still has to gel around them as well. That's only a small piece of the puzzle, the two lads.

"I think the more exciting part of that is they're just two great lads who are going to bring a lot to the dressing room. I know it's hard to appreciate that when you haven't been inside the dressing room.

"But having someone bring in positive energy to a dressing room can do so much for a team."

Macauley was speaking at the announcement that AIG will sponsor the NEIC Trojans, a new basketball club in Dublin's north east inner city that the GAA star is a founding member of.