'This is a good story in sport' - buoyant Bohan hails Dublin's sweetest win
Dublin manager Mick Bohan celebrates with team captain Carla Rowe after their side's victory in the 2023 TG4 LGFA All-Ireland Senior Championship Final match between Dublin and Kerry at Croke Park in Dublin. Photo by Piaras Ó Mídheach/Sportsfile
“As pleasing as it gets in sport.” Coming it as did against the head, Mick Bohan was leaning towards hailing this as the greatest of his five All-Ireland victories as Dublin senior football manager.
Having cultivated a largely new team that was considered also-rans not just by observers but themselves before this season, Bohan was beaming. Not to mention this possibly being his last game in charge.
“We were on our knees back in October, November time,” he recalled. “I know when you win something you can kind of dismiss that a little bit but if you knew where we were, we were trying to maximise everything we had.
“Genuinely, and the group will tell you, we were just trying to make this thing competitive. We didn’t foresee this. Obviously, there’s a bit of knowledge around the scene in this camp. The likes of Frankie Roebuck, Shane Kearney, Paul Casey and Derek Murray, guys who have soldiered with the lads' teams. And that bit of knowledge helps. As Frankie kept telling me all year, you don’t have to have the best deck to win the card game.”
Losing Jess Tobin and Hannah Leahy to season-ending injuries, Bohan wondered if the gods were against him but any doubts he and his management team had were kept to themselves and away from the players.
“We didn't want to tell them our thoughts, we didn't want to tell them our fears but below the surface and the conversations that we had had, we were trying to maximise out... if you look at that defensive unit, we had four seasoned defenders and that was it in the squad.”
Looking back to 10 months ago, Bohan admits he didn’t see champions. “The quality was poor. The bottom line is there was so much to learn. I look at Niamh Donlon, (who) played her first competitive game for us five weeks ago in a challenge game against Mayo. Five weeks ago and she’s after playing in an All-Ireland final and from what I could see gave a fairly decent account of herself.
“Niamh Crowley, her first season out of minor, you’d put her in your pocket – she’s 5ft3in. She has a heart of a lion but that’s the point. They (older players) took them under their wing. I haven’t seen this before in a team. They were like big sisters to them and they taught them so much in that amount of time.
"This is genuinely a really good story in sport. We were not in this arena, we were nowhere close to it and I have been there, I can tell you. This one is sweet.”
In the back of her mind was a Celtic Cross but Dublin centre-back Martha Flynn was just as disbelieving as her manager last autumn. “I think a lot of people had us written off at the start of the year and I think a combination of belief from the older players and energy from the younger players just ended up being an unbelievable concoction that resulted in us creating an atmosphere and energy around the camp.
“The last few weeks has just been climb on climb, getting better and better and to reach this peak today feels actually unbelievable. I never would have put ourselves here back in October so hugely proud.”
In a final where there was no doubt about Dublin’s physical strengths, Bohan took the opportunity to explain his “bullied” remarks about Kerry in their championship Round 1 defeat in Parnell Park in June.
“I have to get it off my chest, it drives me insane in the women’s game – I used the word ‘bullied’. I’ve been a teacher for 33 years. And I know what bullying means on a sports field, and what it means off it. We were bullied in Parnell Park.
“No playing the media, no arra, begorrah stuff – that was a fact. We were beaten to ball, pushed off ball – we got a lesson. We knew that day we had to stand up to that. We had to become more physical in the contest. That’s the way you want this game played.
“I’m listening to the World Cup soccer at the moment and they’re talking about over-physicality – nobody bats an eyelid. That is the way the game is supposed to be played.
“I’ll throw that one back at ye as press and media. When that is said, don’t just take the statement – analyse it. Was it over-physical? Were they beaten physically? That’s not a bad thing. Because we want more contact, we’ve said that all along. But we got a huge lesson that day in Parnell Park.
“We knew what they’d come with. From the start of the year they were the best team in the country, bar none. For me, they had the marquee forward. But here’s sport for you, Leah Caffrey didn’t lie down for the last eight or 10 weeks, go away and decide that Louise Ní Mhuircheartaigh or any other forward was going to be the best forward in the country.”
As for his future, Bohan was more circumspect. “I’m going to be straight with you on this one, regardless of what my decision is today wouldn’t be the day. Today is about players, today is about All-Irelands. It’s an incredible achievement.”
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