Costello expects tough final to go down to the wire

SFC FINAL Dunshaughlin well aware of Wolfe Tones threats

When you talk to Mathew Costello it defies the logic in your brain that he is only 22 years-old.

It was no surprise he was captain of the Meath u-20s a couple of years ago, but already he has solidified his position as a core member of the Meath senior football team leadership group.

When news broke just before throw-in of the All-Ireland SFC game against Louth back in May that Paul Costello, Mathew's father, had sadly passed away, everyone would have understood if Mathew had opted to skip the

game.

But that's not Mathew's way. As measured, mature, composed and likable young man you are ever likely to meet Mathew met his heartbreak head on and did his father and family proud - and next Sunday he is aiming to do that again.

When asked what would winning the Keegan Cup mean to him after such a difficult year, in typical fashion he deflected from himself and thought of others to whom it would mean so much.

"We are just staying focused and treating it like another game. Obviously these games don't come around too often, so we are really looking forward to it," Costello told the Meath Chronicle.

"Dunshaughlin haven't been there (in a SFC final) since 2011, so there's a good vibe around the parish.

"Although in fairness the parish has been used to it over the last couple of years with the ladies doing so well. It is great to learn off them and their experience.

"There are so many great people in our club that have wanted this for so long and have stuck by us. I think of Jim Smith and Jim Gilligan, guys like that, that have looked after us for so long and who were so positive even when things weren't going right for us.

"We just want to give something back to those guys who have put so much time and effort into us. There are too many people to mention, I'm sure every GAA club is the same, but games like this are just for us to give back to them."

Reflecting on Dunshaughlin's roller coaster of the last couple of years that saw them relegated to Intermediate football in 2021, bounce back immediately in 2022, suffer the devastating blow of conceding a late, late goal and losing to Ratoath last year, Costello believes it is all a valuable learning curve, but he always had faith they would get back to where he feels they deserve to be.

"I always knew we were capable of getting to a senior final, but obviously with the track record we had during my first couple of years at senior when it was so difficult even to get out of the group, you know it is a very difficult thing to achieve, so to be here now, we are over the moon," he said.

"We took a lot of learnings from our first year back up at senior last year. Obviously we had three tough games in the group, we won two of them by a point.

"We know that sometimes games can come down to a kick of a ball and last year the Ratoath game didn't go our way, but maybe that gave us more purpose during the off-season to come back ready.

"We put in a long preseason, we were always focused and we were itching to get ourselves back into the quarter-finals and give ourselves the opportunity to put the wrongs right.

"We managed to do that, but we still feel we are not there yet. There is still more to be done."

Dunshaughlin operated out of A FL Div 2 this year and while after some prompting Costello agreed that playing down a division might have helped in terms of bring new players through he insisted that Dunshaughlin should always be aiming to be in the top flight.

"We were unlucky to be relegated in the league last year, we weren't happy about going down. Dunshaughlin always want to be in Div 1, but this year we had to operate out of Div 2.

"Earlier this year we were down a lot of bodies because of injury and we also had three of us in with the Meath seniors and two in with the under-20s, so we really had to utilise a lot of the squad.

"Maybe playing in Div 2, we could build momentum at the right time, but there were tough games in there too. The Trim game in the semi-final and the final against Seneschalstown did us the world of good in terms of playing together.

"Maybe being in Div 2 was a good thing from that point of view, but Dunshaughlin always want to be in Div 1."

When winning the IFC two years ago and in the two years since Dunshaughlin have developed quite the reputation for being a swashbuckling, free-flowing football team that always entertain.

However, in their semi-final win against St Peter's they proved they can also win ugly. Costello admits that if that is what they have to do against a very good Wolfe Tones side to get over the line, then they won't mind winning ugly again.

"You have to learn to win a lot of different way. While you would always love to play free-flowing football and play at your absolute best, sometimes it just doesn't go that way and you find yourselves in battles.

"Being in a tough battle like that second-half against Dunboyne where you can either win by a point or lose by a point, we had to dig deep and thankfully we did and it is massive for us to win like

that.

"Obviously it (the SFC final) is going to be a serious challenge. Wolfe Tones been in four semi-finals in the last four years and they won it only a couple of years ago.

"They have experience on every line of the pitch, they have a great management team. They can win ugly or they can play really great football.

"They have a great kicking game coupled with a great running game off the shoulder, so it is going to be very hard to nullify their key players.

"You know it is going to be one of those games that will probably go down to the wire, so we are going to be have to be ready for that," concluded Costello.