It’s often said that it takes a village to raise a child.
For Dublin champions Cuala, who won their first ever senior football title on Sunday, it takes half a county to train a championship winning team.
That’s because, as manager Austin O’Malley pointed out on RTÉ’s Game On this week, the Dalkey club don’t own any of the pitches they use to train on.
Like many other field game sporting organisations in south Dublin, they are renters. Any visitors to Cuala will know that there are a couple of pitches right beside the clubhouse, but these are the property of Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council.
The senior team had to travel far and wide in their preparations for their successful campaign.
“We actually don’t own a blade of grass. We don’t own a pitch in Cuala, would you believe it,” O’Malley said on 2FM.
“It’s a Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown county council pitch, which obviously is always weather dependent, so it means we’ve got to move to Bray [Emmets]. That’s been a major challenge throughout the whole campaign as well.
“You’re lucky enough if you can get a pitch if Dalkey is closed and there are no lights in Dalkey either. So that’s always a bit of a headache, when you’re planning you really are a hostage to the weather there.
“The club has been great in terms of managing what we have. Drilling out of Shankill or Shanganagh there, and we have our pitch in Dalkey. Laurence’s as well, which is a school, they’re good enough to give us a pitch at times and then Bray as well. But they’re juggling the whole time and it’s a testament to the guys and the girls in the office in Cuala, the job they do.
“The growth of the club and the underage structures, it’s obviously a dual club as well. It’s always a major headache, you know. A great man called Enda McGowan over the years has had a huge, huge part to play in that.”
The effort and coordination of those involved in the club paid a rich dividend at Parnell Park, as they stopped their near neighbours Kilmacud Crokes from winning a first four-in-a-row of Dublin titles since the 1960s.
Attention will soon turn to a meeting with the Kildare champions on 9 November in the Leinster Championship, a competition which only twice since 2011 has not been won by a club from the capital.
Arguably the outsiders against the behemoth that is Crokes, Cuala will suddenly become the favourites for any game they play in the provincial championship.
But for this week anyway, the celebrations can be enjoyed in Dalkey.
“The Dublin championship, they’re hard won,” O’Malley continued.
“I was lucky enough to win one as a player back in the day when UCD used to play in it, but they’re really, really special days. The amount of emotion and just colour and energy around when that final whistle went, it was something that will absolutely live long in my memory.
“It was such a special day for the club and for the group of guys. We’ve probably been on the road a while, I’ve been with them the last three years, and we’ve had days where things definitely didn’t work out for us. Those are the days you learn.”It’s their first time ever doing it.
“And, 36 years since they were in their last one [final]. So just delighted for all the work that’s going on in the club in terms of the underage structures. And the level of alignment and commitment from everybody in the club to get us across the line was just super.”
Hear the full interview with Cuala manager Austin O’Malley below
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