Cavan links to Maynooth's Sigerson tilt

GAA

Fifty years on from their sole outright Sigerson Cup success, Maynooth University’s quest to regain the title continues tonight (Wednesday) as they take on University of Limerick in UL in the quarter-final.

There are a number of Cavan links to the Maynooth set-up, with Killeshandra’s Charlie Gannon and Mountnugent’s Eoin Campbell part of the squad. And, revealed manager Aidan Minnock, they have drawn inspiration from one famous player from the Breffni county, Paddy McGovern.

The Drumalee clubman, who played in two Cavan SFC finals and represented the county, was part of the successful 1976 Maynooth team and still follows the college sides closely.

“Paddy's based up here now, he's a secondary school teacher in Celbridge,” explained Minnock.

“He's chairman of Rathcoffey GAA club now. He was the youngest on the team 50 years ago when they won the Sigerson for the only time, and he's actually in New Zealand at the moment, and he was watching the last match night live on YouTube, and one of the first messages I had when I came off was from Paddy congratulating us, he was watching at 4 o 'clock in the morning.

“That team have a great bond, they still meet up, they're still great friends and they meet regularly, they come to matches, lots of them have been at the matches over the last couple of years but they've been.

“They were in with us last year, some of them, Paddy brought them in just for a chat, talking about 50 years ago when they won and what it was like back then. We have a little 50 on the jersey commemorating the 50 years anniversary of it.”

Gannon, meanwhile, has made the match-day squad for each of the games to date. Maynooth beat St Mary’s, lost to UCD and then defeated DKIT to make this stage. Their first-choice midfield is Meath senior pair Conor Grey and Charlie O’Connor, with Gannon an understudy at present.

“Charlie is in second year and we probably hadn’t seen a lot of him. When the league started, we were only back to college a week and we went with the Meath pairing and hadn't seen a lot of Charlie until the league was over.

“Then we played a number of challenge games to run up to Christmas and that's where Charlie played his way into the squad. Not just in the squad, he's in the matchday squad because of his performances in those games, he has done very well.”

Maynooth take on UL this evening (Wednesday) at 8pm, with the match available to view on UL GAA TV.