True blue Dub is totally devoted to Tribeswomen’s cause

Talking Sport with Stephen Glennon

DUBLIN football and hurling is certainly on a high at present and one man who has played a role in those successes, Tallaght native Barry Downey, will be hoping he can bring a measure of the same to Galway senior ladies footballers.

The Tribeswomen will defend their Connacht title, which they won in such dramatic fashion last year when coming back from a ten-point deficit, at Tuam Stadium on Sunday (4pm) and manager Downey says a victory over Mayo would mean ten times more to him than Dublin’s win over Galway in the Leinster hurling final last Sunday.

It is quite a statement from Downey, who coached many of those Dublin hurlers at underage and is very much a Dub at heart, but that is just a reflection of how heavily invested he is in the fortunes of his adopted county these days. With Downey, it is very much all or nothing.

Of course, Downey is no stranger to the local GAA scene having previously trained both Cortoon Shamrocks, to the 2008 county final where they were beaten by the standard bearers Corofin, and Caltra, with varying degrees of success.

Downey, though, is a respected coach, both in his native Dublin and Galway. Hailing from the St. Anne’s Gaelic football club in Tallaght, he did a pilot GAA coaching course in Thurles for two years in the early 1990s. The primary purpose of the course was to promote hurling in the schools in Dublin.

“From that, I got a guarantee of a job with the Leinster Council as a full-time development officer, of which there are many now. However, I was one of the first of those,” continues the Tuam resident.

“Then I was assigned to the Dublin County Board for six years and it was interesting to see nine of those Dublin hurlers, who I would have coached in development squads at underage in hurling, playing in the Leinster final on Sunday. That was why last Sunday was all the sweeter,” he smiles.

Among those he tutored were Dublin captain John McCaffrey, goalkeeper Gary Maguire, defender Michael Carton and forwards David ‘Dotsy’ O’Callaghan and Conal Keaney. “So, there was a good crew of them that would have come through that period,” he adds.

Having worked in the schools for a number of years, Downey craved a change of scenery and he subsequently took up the post of Games Promotion Officer at DIT – a position he held for two years. “Then I had to get a real job!” laughs Downey, who is a sales manager for an office supplies company.

“Funnily enough, my first coaching roles were with hurling teams, Ballyboden St. Enda’s and Rathmolyon in Meath. We won a county title with Rathmolyon in ’96. In the football then, I was with St. Margaret’s in Dublin and from there I went to Parnells because Brian Talty had left to go to the Dubs.

For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.