A few days out from his county's first All-Ireland senior final, Eamonn Murray doesn't waste time spoofing. In the semi-final against perennial contenders Cork his Meath team are six points behind with two minutes to go – literally; in the women's game there is no injury-time, as time is kept by a countdown clock: had he given up hope?
"Yeah, I certainly had, being honest with you. I just said to Paul Garrigan [coach], 'God, we were hoping for a few All Stars this year' – things changed in those two minutes, thank God.
“A lot of friends of mine and family members of the team had left to go off and have a cup of tea, or go for a walk. They wouldn’t watch it.”
A penalty by Stacey Grimes and a second goal by the excellent Emma Duggan, who went on to kick the decisive scores in extra-time, saved the day, which Meath went on to win.
“We had a plan if we were down a few points to throw Vikki [Wall] and Emma Duggan into the full-forward line and throw in a few high balls.”
There was symmetry in Cork being the opposition. When Murray came in with Garrigan and Michelle Grimes at the end of 2017 to pick up the pieces of Meath football, the most visible impact in the shattering of the county was a 7-22 to 0-3 defeat by All-Ireland champions Cork in Thurles.
“That was a sad, sad day for me at the time as well,” he says, “but it wasn’t the players’ fault that played that day. Nobody wanted to play for Meath at that time. It was very simple. A lot of the girls playing now were playing that day, and they were only 16 or 17 years of age.”
When the seniors came calling, he wasn’t convinced. It wasn’t that he didn’t fancy such an unpromising appointment but over the years he had been happy in a developmental role.
“I never really wanted this job. I always loved the underage set-up in Meath, and I loved producing good players for the seniors. When I was asked to do it I said, ‘No, I don’t want it’.
"The chairman, Fearghal Harney, rang me about five times and I said, 'Look it, if I'm allowed to pick my own selectors and all that?' . . . Meath football was in a bad place, and I wanted people with a smile on their face, to lift them.
“And it wasn’t easy getting those players back in. A lot of players didn’t want to ever play again for Meath. So, it took a lot of phone calls and coaxing. Thank God now we have all the players we needed.”
Incrementally he and the team moved upwards. Re-graded into intermediate in 2016, Meath took their time returning to the top and lost the 2018 and ’19 finals before finally securing their ticket back to the top in last December’s deserted Croke Park finals, beating Westmeath despite conceding early goals.
“This didn’t happen overnight. We had a lot of bad days. Like, we were getting beaten by Wicklow in the championship only a few years ago. Not running them down – they’re in the [junior] final on Sunday.
“Look, we were getting easily beaten by a lot – Wexford beating us day and night so we’ve come a long way in the last couple of years. And it’s nothing really much to do with me; it’s my coaches who are doing all the work, it’s not me, I’m only doing the talking, they do all the action.”
Had he any idea that they might make such an impact in the first season back in senior?
“No, but after the All-Ireland final we were hoping we’d stay in Division Two and not be relegated from senior so this is really a bonus for us. We’re really enjoying it. We took one step at a time – then Covid came along and they actually came back to us in April in a lot better shape than we had left them at Christmas.”
Meath emerged from a group with Cork and Tipperary to reach the All-Ireland quarter-finals where they sprang a first surprise, defeating an Armagh side that had run Dublin close in the 2020 semi-final. Now, just over seven months after climbing out of intermediate they are in the senior final for the first time and facing five-in-a-row aspirants Dublin.
“We’re trying to keep their feet on the ground, exciting times for the whole county, the country really – we’re getting good wishes from all around the country and farther afield, so it’s very special.
“We’ve a lot of girls from Meath playing football; we’ve 7,500 members and very few counties would have that. I know Dublin probably have that, maybe Galway and Cork, but it’s a big sport in Meath.”
That much is clear.
