Clare's Darren O'Neill grateful for second coming in saffron and blue

MIDFIELD GENERAL: Darren O'Neill and Pearse Lillis of Clare celebrate following the Munster SFC semi-final win over Limerick at TUS Gaelic Grounds. Pic: Tom Beary/Sportsfile

Our opening question to Darren O’Neill was not exactly Pulitzer Prize-winning.

Are you long on the Clare football panel, we enquired.

O’Neill’s reply spoke of an unconventional journey. O’Neill’s reply left plenty to unpack and work through.

“I have had a weird oul inter-county career. Kinda mad the way it went,” said the 32-year-old Clare midfielder.

The top line - and it’s an attention-grabbing one - is that 10 years separated O’Neill’s first and second championship appearances.

His debut season was 2011. His championship debut was that summer’s Munster quarter-final defeat to Cork. He was 20 at the time. A kid. The teenage years had only recently been vacated. Open road stretched out in front of him.

When his championship appearance count eventually doubled from one to two, O’Neill had gone from 20-year-old rookie to 30-year-old returnee. Another Munster quarter-final appearance, 10 years after his first.

2011. Pause. 2021.

What happened in between. Well, how long have you got?

“It was a bit of everything,” O’Neill begins. Talk about an understatement.

“A week after I started against Cork in the championship, I broke my hand in a challenge game against Waterford. That ruled me out for the rest of the inter-county season.” 

In 2012, he hit off to America for the summer. It was his last summer as a college student. There was life to be lived outside the four white lines.

It was a decision that cost him involvement in the county’s most recent Munster final appearance. Disappointing to miss out, of course. But surely there’d be another provincial final outing not too far down the road.

Eleven years later and that box will finally be ticked on Sunday.

Anyway, back to 2012. He came home from the J1 and broke his leg while lining out for Éire Óg Ennis in the county championship. The leg break saw him miss the following year’s league. And although he got back for a bit of the championship, he didn’t feature.

In 2014, he broke his collarbone. Another season written off.

“I got frustrated with it all,” said O’Neill, looking back. Could you blame him?

“There was a heap of work opportunities to go to Dublin. A good few of my mates had moved up, so that was the route I took.

“I initially travelled up and down for around 18 months to play for Éire Óg, but the travelling got to me after a while.” 

He transferred to Naomh Olaf on the city’s southside. Save for a retirement statement, his inter-county story was finished.

“The door was fully closed in my mind. While I was taking football seriously up in Dublin, it was because I wanted to do well for my new club.” 

A member of Colm Collins’ backroom team was Dublin-based. He spotted O’Neill faring well for Naomh Olaf.

In between the 2018 Allianz League finishing up and Munster championship throwing in, an old number popped up on his phone screen.

“The call came out of the blue. When those calls come, you can't turn them down. I didn't want to turn it down either.” 

He accepted Collins' invitation to rejoin the Clare camp. He began commuting down to Caherlohan and Cusack Park for championship-tuning sessions on dry sod. He made the matchday panel on Sundays, but no one beckoned him down from the stand.

The Banner were well stocked at midfield with Gary Brennan and Cathal O’Connor. O’Neill was an option but not first choice.

His place in the pecking order he was determined to change in 2019.

“I did my cruciate then at the end of 2018. It was one thing after another constantly,” he said of that particular setback.

“I missed all of 2019. It took me a serious amount of time to come back from that. Three surgeries were needed, in total. The brilliant thing about Colm was that he said come back in again when you are ready.

“I was on the panel in 2020 but didn't get much of a look in. Stayed with it. In 2021, I had a good season under my belt, stayed injury-free, and broke into the team. I have just been trying to build on that since then.” 

As mentioned at the top, Clare’s 2021 championship opener and closer against Kerry saw O’Neill bridge a 10-year gap to his sole summer start. The number eight shirt continued to hang off his dressing room peg for their four championship outings last year.

Broken bones in his hand suffered during Clare’s first league outing of 2023 threatened a return to old, frustrated ways. More surgery. More time on the sideline.

He rehabbed away in the background and reappeared for the second half of their famous Munster quarter-final win over Cork. He again came off the bench for the semi-final victory over Limerick.

On Sunday at TUS Gaelic Grounds, he’ll make his first start of the season since the league opener. For once, his timing is impeccable.

“I know I am 32, but I still have plenty of goals that I want to achieve in the Clare jersey. I don't see myself as the second oldest in the panel. I still hope to be there for a while yet.

“My employers, Mitsubishi Fund Services, have been so accommodating during my second stint with Clare, especially when I was still based in Dublin. They’ve been brilliant.” 

O’Neill, who relocated with his fiancée back to Ennis in recent years, is incredibly grateful for this second coming in saffron and blue.

“If 2014 had been my last year with Clare, I would have had massive regrets. When I was younger, I wonder did I give it the commitment levels I am giving it now. At the moment, it is total commitment. That's what it has to be. You can't half-arse these things. I would have had massive regrets if it didn't materialise the way it has.

“The earlier injuries, I probably didn't handle them as well as I should have. I just remember not doing what I needed to do. When you get injured, you nearly need to pay more attention to getting yourself right and getting yourself back. But when I was younger, I kinda took it as a break and never got myself fully rehabbed.” 

O’Neill is a far more mature figure and footballer than he was when Michael McDermott gave him his inter-county start 13 seasons ago.

As for the collective, where does he see the greatest difference between the classes of 2011 and ‘23?

“I look back on that team and there were players there who are still regarded as some of the best Clare ever had, the likes of Gary Brennan, Gordon Kelly, and David Tubridy. We had an excellent crop of players, but I am not sure if the belief was there, or is as high as it is now.

“We have had some good performances in recent years but haven't managed to get over the line in the biggest games. I think it is important for this group to get over the line in a big game like this one coming up.”