Breffni Beat: Forde will be a huge addition to Cavan Gaels

Eamonn Gaffney wrote here a couple of weeks ago that the Gaels are still the team to beat, and he has been proven right. A youthful Ramor United side threw all they had at them last Sunday evening but the Gaels kept on keeping on, as the song says, and just had too much. Local bookmaker Sean Sheils makes Cavan Gaels a shade of odds on to regain the county title. That's about right. At the time of writing, it's theirs to lose, which is strange given their less-than-perfect build-up. The Gaels went through some turmoil earlier in the season, losing four league matches and drawing another, and they parted company with their team trainer Declan McStravick. Manager Darren Chapman remained in place, but Anthony Forde has come on board and the feeling is that the Fermanagh man's role may have been diluted, and that the Gaels will be stronger for having the brooding figure of Forde patrolling the sideline. Forde was a lionhearted defender for Cavan for over a decade - he was one of the best footballers in the country around 2001 - and has the makings of an excellent manager, too. Word from the Under 21 camp was that he played a huge role in the management team alongside bainisteoir Terry Hyland and the other selectors, and one player (not from the Cavan Gaels club) told me that the Cavan seniors could "do a lot worse" than bring the former Shannon Gaels clubman into the senior fold. Great player that he was in the royal blue and white, very few football people in this county will be wishing Anthony well in his current role. There is no point ignoring the elephant in the room - the Gaels are almost universally disliked among the other clubs in the county. Ironically, one of the reasons often cited for this is their acquisition of two of the best footballers in the county, Forde and Micheál Lyng, at a time when they were in the middle of an amazing run of nine successive minor championships. In short, they, of all clubs, didn't need them, but they took them anyway - or so the theory goes. When I interviewed then Cavan Gaels PRO and current selector Mark Gillick back in 2005, he bristled at the notion that the club "poached" players. "We have been accused of headhunting players in the past which is totally false. Any player who transferred to Cavan Gaels in the past did so for valid reasons. We had already won a senior championship before either Anthony Forde or Michael Lyng, for example, joined the club, so it's not a question of going out looking for players just to win a championship." Of course, the real reason the Gaels are so unpopular is that they win, and win and win again. Success breeds contempt. The Gaels have that "town team" swagger alright, and maybe a bit of a chip on their shoulder in some cases, but no more than champions anywhere. They know they're not liked and that feeds a siege mentality. The fact of the matter is that Cavan Gaels are where they are through hard work. A big pick guarantees nothing. Of the other towns in the county, Arva are in junior ranks, Bailieborough look to be heading that way having lost three from three in the Intermediate Championship. Cootehill haven't won a county championship at adult level since the early 1970s. The artists formerly known as Kildallan, Ballyconnell First Ulsters (or Worst Ulsters as one smart-arse christened them recently) are languishing at the foot of the bottom division... Cavan Gaels, for their part, feels that they haven't always been dealt with entirely fairly by referees and were sufficiently aggravated to propose a motion on the selection of officials for last year's county convention. An accusation levelled at them is that they have consistently capitulated in the Ulster Championship. Look at it another way, though: maybe what stopped the Gaels from winning an Ulster Club title was their lack of a challenge in Cavan. They were good enough a couple of years ago to defeat the mighty St Gall's in their fortress of Milltown, west Belfast. They also had the Galls beaten out the gate in Breffni before imploding and losing four players to the line - had they routinely come through such battles in Cavan, there's no doubt they would have handled that pressure better. So have they got that challenge this year? The manner of their win over Ramor suggests not. The Gaels won the tactical battle and their old dogs, the indefatigable Cathal Collins and Enda King, relished the hard road. Throw in the dead-eyed brilliance of Johnston and they are halfway there. But still, there are some question marks. The jury is still out on some of their younger brigade - they are the classiest of players, but only the very best will be fit to replace the likes of Collins, King and Eamon Reilly. And their management situation - losing a trainer, bringing in a new manager/trainer while keeping the original one, who managed their biggest rivals last year - won't have helped. Micheál Lyng hasn't shown his best form yet (though he links well with Johnston), and Martin Dunne and "Jelly" are possibly too similar, too; both would maybe thrive off a target man. These are small things, though. They welcome Under 21 winners Kevin Meehan, Marc Leddy and Niall Smith home from the States in time for the next round - a timely boost, even if it's not needed. Of the contenders, Ramor, along, notably, with Castlerahan and Crosserlough, are building from the bottom up and aren't that far from a breakthrough. Champions Kingscourt have played two, won none, and may not have the hunger they showed in 2010. Either Castlerahan or Redhills will be gone after next weekend and Gowna are at their lowest ebb since they made their breakthrough in the 80s. Two teams could do it: Ballinagh look the real deal and have already beaten the Gaels twice this season and another who could spoil the procession is Mullahoran. The Dreadnoughts have always put it up to the Gaels and rarely go down easy, but the town side usually just have that little extra, a trump card to play from the bench or a shimmering of class to settle the match. They have the knack of being able to silence Mullahoran's big guns and over-run the rest. The Dreadnoughts are almost perennial "number twos". They were second best to the great Kingscourt team and to the brilliant Gowna side of the 90s, and then to Cavan Gaels of the noughties, squeezing in just two championship victories (1998 and 2006) in that time. They put in a huge effort last year and couldn't take a misfiring Gaels, but they're back for more and, if and when they meet the Gaels, the battle will be the most intriguing of the year. A team will always bear the hallmarks of their manager. Forde's are committed and business-like and up for the challenge, just as he was as a player. At this stage of the game, that looks like it will be enough.