Published: Wednesday, 24th February, 2010 5:00pm
END TO END: Time has arrived to make good on a promise
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Cavan have been well beaten by Antrim in their last two meetings.
Hindsight is a wonderful thing, and can make fools of us all, especially those who commit their views to print. Just sometimes, though, written words can be prescient.
A year ago this week, after a humbling at the hands of Tipperary in Breffni Park, this column asked the following question:
"Are the Cavan players hurting this week? They didn't look like a team playing with passion, with a fear of failure or a pride in the jersey last Sunday. Come to think of it, they didn't look like a team at all.
"The current panel have the trappings - the gear, the status - but after the manner of last Sunday's submission, they have lost some of the respect of the supporters."
The article went on:
"Whether emanating from his military background or stern appearance, Tom Carr has a reputation as a disciplinarian but so far, the Cavan manager hasn't convinced in that department."
Twelve months later, and with the benefit of the hindsight we mentioned, can Cavan honestly say that we have made progress? Has the manager "convinced" yet?
There was much snide smirking in the national media - where Carr, an always-willing interviewee, is well-regarded - when club delegates proposed a vote of no confidence in the manager last summer.
"Typical short-sighted Cavan" was the general line taken. "Win nothing for 40 years, then shaft a new manager after six months"... That was wrong, and it irked many genuine Cavan supporters to be patronised in such a manner.
When Carr took over in a blaze of publicity, his one abiding promise was to "make Cavan competitive". In his first year, he didn't do this, or come close to it. Clubs took a fire and ice approach - some reared up and wanted him gone but others kept a cool head and urged caution. The county committee voted en bloc to save him. He survived.
We are now in his second season and, sad as it is to say, we look as far away from a breakthrough, or even from being competitive, as ever.
While the current group of players aren't the best in the country, surely they are capable of better than being hammered at home by a shadow Antrim team minus up to eight regulars?
If a handful of footballers aren't performing, it can be seen as an individual thing but when a team appear, in a lot of cases, unfit, weak and off the pace, questions must be asked about preparation and motivation.
So, let's ask these questions. Why were the Cavan senior team so poor ten days ago against Antrim? Tom Carr stated that he "couldn't chase the game on the sideline" and he's right in that some established players, who have made the team as big names on Cavan's conveyor belt of losing minor and Under 21 teams, have let him down. An underage reputation is a worthless currency for a senior inter-county footballer - performance and results are everything.
But this is a serious business and the buck stops with the manager. He picks the team and oversees preparations, remember.
To raise these points isn't being disloyal, or disrespectful to any individual either. In fact it's the opposite; hard questions have to be posed after unacceptable performances.
Cavan were flattered by the scoreline in the Roscommon match but at least the desire and workrate was there. Six days later against Antrim, the hallmarks of the last 12 months - lifeless, flat, ponderous play - were all too evident.
The times we live in demand that everything be viewed through a monetary prism too and to look at Cavan's failures purely in financial terms makes for even more alarming reading. The human tragedy of job losses is everywhere here in the Border region, which never fully succumbed to the full charms of the Tiger yet is suffering the backlash harder than most.
Yet Cavan teams have had - wait for it - a grand total of €1,695,842 spent on them on the past three seasons. The lion's share of this went on the senior football panel.
To break it down even further, according to the accounts presented to the county convention last December, Cavan team travelling expenses for 2009 alone were €248, 821. Over an average of just an eight-month season - realistic considering the minors, Under 21s, juniors, senior footballers and senior hurlers won a single championship match between them - this works out at €31,102 per month.
That's a massive investment for a paltry return. In business, someone would be held responsible for this; let's face facts - someone, or more than one, would lose their job.
Sean Johnston said in an interview last week that Cavan supporters "all need to realise that they can't live in the past and that we are a long way down the pecking order." He's right, but it's unfair to ask supporters not to expect an acceptable level of performance.
There has been a backlash in the county over the past week to the performance. The manager has been in situ since September 2008, 17 months ago, so the excuse peddled last year of not having enough time doesn't cut it.
This isn't a witch hunt. Tom Carr is a thoroughly decent man and a popular figure with players; he could still be the right man to lead us, but we need to start seeing signs of progress. Rather, this is a reflection of the frustration on the ground among ordinary supporters, who just want the team to do themselves and our footballing tradition justice.
On that note, worryingly, the anger has almost gone, too, extinguished and replaced with a wistful shrug. One supporter contacted the offices of this newspaper last week to voice his opinion on the Antrim match. "Will we ever have a team again?" he asked wearily. Who can give him an answer to that? When will this manager make good his promise and make us "competitive"?
Hindsight, which we mentioned before, plays tricks. Two years ago, former manager Donal Keogan was derided but what would we give for an unbeaten seven-match league run or a championship win over Antrim now?
Cavan supporters - Club Breifne members, sponsors, die-hards, old-timers and starry-eyed teenagers - desperately crave a team to be proud of.
The promises and bluster are useless now - it's time we walked the walk, starting with the trip to Drogheda on Sunday week.
