It has the air of a throwback championship weekend in Leinster and yet for both Louth and Kildare the outcome of Sunday’s provincial semi-final in Tullamore carries significant ramifications for the future.
The decision of Leinster Council to move the semis out of Croke Park and fix them for provincial venues should hopefully bring some of the buzz back to the competition. It certainly can’t harm.
You’d hope both Portlaoise and Tullamore will be able to drum up some old-school championship colour and atmosphere.
You can imagine the slagging and divilment between the Dublin and Meath fans in O’Moore Park, but O’Connor Park is where the difference between victory and defeat is a canyon. The consequences are far greater.
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For Louth and Kildare, it’s win or bust – knockout championship football has come calling for both teams at the end of April. It couldn’t be any more straightforward – the winner plays in the All-Ireland series, the loser does not.
And Tailteann Cup football is not where either group of players see themselves spending this summer.
Kildare played Longford in front of a few hundred people in the Tailteann Cup last May, that match taking place at Hawkfield just 24 hours before Louth faced Dublin in the Leinster SFC final at Croke Park. The contrast was stark and it should act as a reminder of what the implications are for the loser in Tullamore on Sunday.
There was little appetite for the Tailteann Cup in Kildare last season and I can’t imagine there would be any greater hunger this time around.
Louth have managed to qualify for the All-Ireland series in all of the last three years so they will want to maintain that proud record.
Ger Brennan has done a very impressive job since taking over from Mickey Harte.
As a player in the Dublin dressingroom, Ger was always very analytical when discussing football, he understood the game. I always felt he talked a lot of sense and as a player on the field he tended to be in the right place at the right time.
He is also a really good people person and was well liked in the dressingroom. He has been able to transfer those skills to management – the Louth players appear to like and respect him, and he has certainly got a tune out of them over the last two seasons.
After Harte stepped down, there was probably a feeling Louth would slip away again, perhaps drop back to Division 3 and settle in as the fourth or fifth best team in Leinster again. But that has not been the case. In fact, if anything, they look to have improved and developed more depth to their squad.
Noticeably, whenever they have come up against their main rivals in the province, this Louth team has performed – they beat Kildare in last year’s Leinster semi-final and also got the better of the Lilywhites in both the 2023 and 2024 National League.
They defeated Meath in this year’s National League and also put one over their neighbours in last summer’s All-Ireland SFC group stages.
In fact, Louth probably don’t get the credit they deserve for their level of consistency in recent years.
Ger has assembled a strong backroom team around him, including James McCartan and Niall Moyna. I worked under Niall with DCU and with Dublin, his attention to detail is meticulous and he would always have lads in the best shape possible.
These are encouraging times for Louth football – the minors are through to the knockout stages of their championship while during the week the county’s under-20s beat Dublin to qualify for back-to-back Leinster finals at that grade.
Should the seniors overcome Kildare on Sunday, it will be the first time since 1912-14 that Louth will play in three consecutive deciders. Growth. Development.
But this upward trajectory comes with a health warning because it brings with it extra pressure and higher expectations. If Louth were to miss out on the All-Ireland series and find themselves in the Tailteann Cup this summer, that could derail much of the progress.
Kildare are approaching this semi-final from a different starting point, but with equally as much pressure.
This is Brian Flanagan’s first season in charge and I’d imagine two of his main targets this year were to secure promotion in the league and qualify for the Leinster final. They have achieved one of those already, though their form tailed off in the latter stages of the league.
Kildare need to give Flanagan time to build a senior team and from what I’ve seen it appears he is trying to mix players from those successful underage sides with some of the more established footballers like Kevin Feely and David Hyland. They had a decent win over Westmeath last time out but Flanagan is still trying to find the right blend in terms of his team.
At senior level, Kildare haven’t delivered on their potential for several years. The games we played against them always tended to start competitively but, for whatever reasons – whether it was talent, squad depth or strength and conditioning –, we would usually overpower them midway through or in the latter stages.
It’s a big football county so it’s a peculiar one as to why they haven’t kicked on at senior level, they should be doing better than they are based on underage success and population.
They have flattered to deceive all too often and another summer in the second tier competition would be a further barrier on their way to becoming a force at senior level again.
Kildare fans will need to be patient and allow the younger players to develop at this level but they need to be exposed consistently to top-level football so dropping down to the Tailteann Cup won’t serve them best in that regard.
For both counties there is much at stake, and not just for 2024 because defeat this weekend will have repercussions for the seasons ahead too.
It might be a throwback Sunday for the Leinster SFC but in Tullamore the future is on the line. For that reason, this is the biggest game of the weekend.
Louth are probably further along in terms of their development right now and while there is likely to be very little between the sides, I feel they might just get the job done and progress to a third consecutive Leinster decider.
