O'Reilly: 'This is our greatest test'

GAA news

Arva manager Finbar O’Reilly is under no illusions – the All-Ireland JFC final against Listowel Emmets (Sunday, 1.30pm, Croke Park) will represent a major step-up for his side.

Arva have a few injury concerns heading into the game, with O’Reilly stating that he is “hoping they’ll be fit but there is no guarantee”.

“Unfortunately, we seem to have had a lot of niggles all season. The Cavan final and the Ulster final were the only two games this year where we had absolutely everybody available," O’Reilly told the Anglo-Celt.

“Conal Sheridan picked up a little niggle in the warm-up on Saturday so he didn’t play, Danny Ellis is carrying a little niggle and so is Thomas Brady. That’s the honest truth so at this moment in time, we’re hoping that they’ll be able to take their place or play some part on Sunday because we’ll certainly need them, there’s no doubt about that.

“Above all games, this is it now. This is our greatest test on Sunday, there’s no doubt about that. These are a good team and it’s going to take Arva at their absolute best to get the job done.”

The former Cavan senior placekicker has been “very impressed” with Listowel.

“They have strength all over the field, they have fantastic running power from their defence, very comfortable ball-players, really good kickers, they have huge honesty in their team, they work and chase for each other and work as a team.

“They’re a typical Kerry team, they like to kick the ball, they have a fantastic full-forward in Brian Sweeney, he has a couple of All-Ireland minor medals. They have another guy inside, David Keane, kicks the frees, very accurate. It’s difficult to find weaknesses in them, it really is.

“They’re very comfortable footballers, that stood out from the first time I saw them… You put that into Croke Park on a pristine surface and no breeze, it will make them a tougher proposition. We’re under no illusions as to what’s ahead, it’s a tough, tough challenge.”

That said, O’Reilly has been notably bullish all season about his side’s chances. He is not one for playing the poor mouth; from the outset, his philosophy has been consistent – if Arva prepare well and perform, they will be competitive with anyone. He admits that from the off, he felt deep down that if all went well, Arva could make it to Croke Park.

“We felt if we could get out of Cavan, anything was possible. Within Cavan, we would have seen Knockbride as the big threat and I can’t emphasise how much of a threat we saw them as. We got past them and out of Cavan and after that, we knew it was going to take a good team to beat us.

“We took each game as it came, we knew we were good enough to get through a lot of the games which new have done to date. With that in mind, we felt an Ulster title was within our reach and once you achieve that, well, Croke Park comes on to the horizon.

“We had the tricky game against Wandsworth and once we got to the semi-final, this was it, ‘if we win this, we’re heading to Croker’ and that kept the focus really, really sharp and kept the motivation high.

“It was ‘get out of Cavan and go hard at each game and perform to your best’ and that served us well to this point. Yes, it was deep, deep, deep in our minds that this was possible but it was a long way off and you take each game at a time.

“I think with Arva, losing last year’s final was really, really tough for them and left a really deep scar with them. For me, it was about instilling belief into them and confidence. Whether I said it publicly or privately, I would have felt that it was always going to take a good team to beat us.

“Even in the Division 1 league, any time we had our full complement of players, we gave Gowna, Kingscourt, these teams, a really good game. So that sort of copper-fastened it in our minds, if we can perform, if we can get our match-ups, tactics and focus right, it is going to take a good team to beat us.

“We’ve stuck by that all through and it has stood us well.”

While Arva’s defence has been mean, conceding only four goals in 12 matches, they have played free-flowing attacking football, too.

“We know we’ve good players on every line, starting from our goalkeeper. We do set out to attack teams, we try to identify weaknesses in teams no more than anybody else. We’re very conscious of the strengths that other teams possess and we try our best to limit those and see can we marry the two and that sort of approach has worked well for us.

“We have scoring power in Conal Sheridan and Kevin Bouchier, Johnny McCabe, Tristan and Barry Donnelly, we know those boys can score so if we can get the balance between limiting the strengths of the opposition and punishing the weaknesses as well, we’re going to play a lot of good open football.

“We have met all types of teams throughout this campaign. Very defensive teams – Lisnaskea sat 14 or 15 men behind the ball – and man-to-man, very physical, in your face teams like Ballymaguigan, very vocal. We’ve had to deal with all types of approaches but we have stuck to our guns, stuck to our game plan, work hard, limit the opposition, punish their weaknesses and it has worked out in that we have turned over a lot of teams, we’ve conceded very few goals and at the other end, we have kicked scores as well.”

This week, Arva will stick to their usual schedule of training, with a team meeting on Saturday, as the area gears up for a massive occasion.

“It’s very exciting for the people of Arva, they’re getting very giddy down there. They’ve had a couple of fantastic months.

“They’re great people, they’re great GAA people and they’ll be heading to Croke Park en masse. It’s just a fantastic day for them and for Cavan football.

“It’s a long, long time since we had a team in an All-Ireland championship final. We’re excited and we’re looking forward to it.”