An Cosantóir

An Cosantóir February 2019 www.dfmagazine.ie 32 | BY COMDT ALAN COURTNEY A fter a disappointing representative series in late 2017 in which the Defence Forces Gaelic Football Team lost all three fixtures against An Garda Síochána, Bank of Ireland and Allied Irish Banks, the only way was up in 2018. Being competitive against the calibre of the opposition the DF would come up against was always going to be difficult but a meeting convened by DF Football Chairman, Lt Col Mark Prendergast in January, gave cause for optimism. Further discussion on the subject led to the appointment of Comdt Ross Glavin as the new Team Manager. Ross had recently led his club Moorefield to the Kildare and Leinster Senior Club Football Titles and his appointment signalled a serious state- ment of intent. Ross quickly set about appointing his backroom team, which included selectors Lt Col Kieran Carey, Comdt Mark Lennon and selector/coach CQMS Philip Wolfe. Flt Sgt Rick Kearns (Statistician), Pte Eugene O'Toole (Kit Man) and Cpl Christy Dempsey (Asst Coach) completed the management team. Comdt Alan Courtney was also drafted in to provide logistics support to the management team. The first encounter with potential players was an open trial in the DFTC, which was attended by over 40 players and was followed by a familiarisation BBQ. A fixture with the Under- dogs, TG4s TV series team was mooted and further training sessions and team bonding pool sessions whittled the panel to 29 for the eagerly anticipated televised game. The Defence Forces Team defeated the Underdogs by two points after a very competitive match and it was obvious that there were some very good players within the DF but more importantly that the team was starting to develop an iden- tity, style of play and togetherness under Glavin's steward- ship and were an honest, hardworking and organised unit. The next training session was organised for the GAA's centre of Excellence in Abbottstown, which was followed by a BBQ that evening and a motivational team talk the next morning by former World Boxing Champion, High Perfor- mance Director of the IABA and member of Dublin Senior Football backroom, Bernard Dunne who spoke to the players about how they can prepare individually to perform collec- tively within the unique set-up that is DF Football. As the team was developing very well, so too were arrange- ments for the representative series as fixtures were con- firmed in Croke Park for the An Garda Síochána (GS) & Allied Irish Banks (AIB) games and an invite to London to play Bank of Ireland (BOI) was given Ministerial approval. First up in Croke Park on Monday the 22nd of October were the Gardaí. Their high profile inter county players Aidan O'Mahony (Kerry), David Clarke (Mayo), Emlyn Mulligan (Leitrim), Denis Glennon (Westmeath) and Eamon Callaghan (Kildare) were very impressive early on, organised in defence and decisive and incisive in attack putting them six points clear with fifteen minutes remaining. The Defence Forces team were never beaten and showed great composure to

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