And Shelbourne midfielder JJ Lunney believes that the old-school values from manager Damien Duff, combined with a strong work ethic, can ensure that the Reds will be top of the pile again at the end of the 2025 campaign.
It was back to work for the league champions on Monday, their pre-season starting with some gym sessions before the harder stuff on the training ground in the weeks to come.
For Dubliner Lunney it brought back memories of their pre-season 12 months ago.
Damien Duff’s brother, a serving member of the Defence Forces, had previously taken the squad for a bruising session but as he was serving abroad, the task fell to coach David McAllister who worked the squad very hard with one particular session on the beaches of Co Meath.
“I have these two scars from crawling on the beach,” says Lunney, pausing to pull down his socks to prove the point, as he spoke at an event to launch the Reds’ new sponsorship deal with Chadwicks.
“Two weeks after I got them, everything was sticking to my legs and it was a tough experience trying to sleep at night.
“We had to crawl about 100 metres up and back on the beach. All the skin was fully gone off my knees and I clearly have the reminders.
“I said to him [McAllister], it’s a reminder of a league winning year so I will take the scarring for the year we had.”
The 2024 season was Lunney’s ninth in the league but the most successful, after earlier spells with St Patrick’s Athletic, Waterford and Bohemians and he puts a lot of that down to Duff.
“You can look at the progress he’s had with us since he’s been in. You buy into it, or you’re gone, pretty much. He is ruthless in that way, but everyone buys into it and the people who haven’t have left the club,” says the 26-year-old.
“I think it’s a great way to be. But he has that man-management too where he can give you the arm around the shoulder. It’s not just ruthless all the time. It has shown in what he has done so far.”
Part of that is Duff telling his players that while they were entitled to celebrate the league win, it’s now time to end the partying and get to work.
“We enjoyed a bit of celebrating, we had six weeks there but he made us aware that we’re back now and there’s no funny business after this. We’re back to it,” he says.
“He came in after the gym session and said obviously the fun is over now, he was just making it clear that we’re back, pre-season is starting now, it’s not starting in January, it’s kicking off today.
“He’s great at picking a team that gets on well together and I think that’s massive. Throughout the year you might be struggling and there’s tough times, and everyone gets on well and keep the spirits high and that’s massive.
“We have one or two team nights out during the year which are great obviously, blow off some steam. Even if you’re having bad times it’s important to do it then but we definitely enjoyed ourselves at the end of the season.
“It might have been different had the Derry game not gone the way we wanted but the break is important. It’s tough physically and emotionally throughout the year because we probably made it hard for ourselves during the season, even to the last day.
“For me, I found emotionally as well as physically it took a toll on my body so the six weeks off was a nice break and I think everyone was happy to be in on Monday.
“He has said to us, it’s not ‘one and done’, I think those were the exact words he used, it’s not a case of relax now and float through the season, we’ll be the team to beat, everyone has a spring in their step when playing the champions, it was Rovers for the last few years, it will be us next year.
“We want the league and every competition you play in, you want to be. The cup, we want to have a good run in that, and get to the final, obviously Drogheda had a good time in that this year, and we want that to be us.”
