Cavan county football team

The Cavan county football team represents Cavan in men's Gaelic football and is governed by Cavan GAA, the County Board of the Gaelic Athletic Association. The team competes in the three major annual inter-county competitions; the All-Ireland Senior Football Championship, the Ulster Senior Football Championship and the National Football League.

Cavan
Sport:Football
Irish:An Cabhán
Nickname(s):The Breffni County
The Breffni Men
The Breffni Blues
County board:Cavan GAA
Manager:Mickey Graham
Captain:Raymond Galligan
Home venue(s):Breffni Park, Cavan
Recent competitive record
Current All-Ireland status:All-Ireland (SF) in 2020
Last championship title:1952
Current NFL Division:3 (7th in 2020 Division 2)
Last league title:1947–48
First colours
Second colours

Cavan's home ground is Breffni Park, Cavan. The team's manager is Mickey Graham.

The team last won the Ulster Senior Championship in 2020, the All-Ireland Senior Championship in 1952 and the National League in 1948.

History
Cavan (blue) in action against Queen's University Belfast in the 2009 Dr McKenna Cup

Cavan is the most successful football county in the province of Ulster, having won the All-Ireland Senior Football Championship five times, the Ulster Senior Football Championship 40 times, and the National Football League once.

All-Ireland years

In the 1933 All-Ireland semi-final in Breffni Park, Cavan beat Kerry with a last minute goal from Vincent McGovern, ending their five-in-a-row bid.[1] Cavan later went on to defeat Galway by one point in the final to become the first Ulster county to win the Sam Maguire Cup.

Two years later, Cavan defeated Kildare in the 1935 final to bring home their second title in three years.

Cavan's reached the final again in 1947 after defeat of Roscommon in the semi-final. The final was played at the Polo Grounds in New York City, the only time the final was held outside of Ireland. Kerry scored two early goals, but Cavan settled and goals from Joe Stafford and Mick Higgins meant they led by a point at half-time. Peter Donohoe kicked eight points over the hour to seal a famous victory for Cavan on a scoreline of 2-11 to 2-7 to bring Sam Maguire to Cavan for the third time.[2]

Cavan followed this up with a one-point win over Mayo in 1948, to win back-to-back titles. The county reached its third successive final in 1949, but was denied a three-in-a-row by Meath, losing by four points.

Cavan later avenged this defeat, overcoming Meath after a replay in 1952 to bring home the county's fifth, and most recent, All-Ireland title. It remains Cavan's latest appearance in an All-Ireland final.

1970-present

Donegal All-Ireland winner Martin McHugh was appointed as senior manager ahead of the 1995 season. At this time, Cavan had not won a game in the Ulster Championship in the previous seven years.[3] Cavan won the 1997 Ulster Final, after beating Derry by a point. Stephen King was captain.[4] Martin McHugh was manager; he later described the aftermath as follows: "It was crazy, like something you would see out in Argentina. I was worried that someone was going to get killed under the bus, they'd gone mad".[4] Cavan supporters thronged Hill 16 for the All-Ireland semi-final against Kerry, King acknowledging that — despite the early goal from Fintan Cahill — Kerry "deserved their win".[4] After the semi-final, McHugh stepped down as manager having served three years. He cited putting his family first as the reason for leaving.[5]

With Val Andrews as manager, Cavan once again reached the Ulster final again in 2001.[6] A goal from Jason Reilly had Cavan leading at half time, but a strong finish from Tyrone meant they ran out winners on a 1-13 to 1-11 scoreline.[7]

Cavan's most notable achievement in the early part of the 21st-century was ending Seán Boylan's long spell as manager of Meath in 2005.[8][4] Less than a year after this success, Waterford defeated Cavan in the league to halt its push for promotion.[4] Cian Mackey was among several players who were "rested" for the game and not included among the substitutes.[4] The Waterford win was inspired by a line in the Cavan matchday programme that Cavan's defeat would be akin to the "sinking of the Titanic", with Waterford manager John Kiely using this to stir the away team into action.[4]

Mackey later said: "One game turned the whole thing on its head for years. We didn't really recover from that for years, from pushing so close to promotion".[4]

Manager Donal Keogan got the county promoted the following year but league restructuring landed Cavan in Division 2 instead.[4] Relegation to Division 3 quickly followed.

Cavan lost to Antrim in the 2009 Ulster SFC.[4]

The county narrowly avoided relegation to Division 4 in 2012 following a loss by a scoreline of 4–6 to 0–12 to Antrim, surviving because already-relegated Tipperary defeated Offaly when an Offaly win would have sent Cavan down on the head-to-head result.[4][9][10]

Former senior player Mickey Graham was appointed as manager ahead of the 2019 season.[11] Fellow Cavanman Dermot McCabe and Monaghan's Martin Corey joined him.[12] Cavan reached the 2019 Ulster SFC final in Graham's first season as manager, losing to Donegal. In 2020, Graham led Cavan to consecutive Ulster SFC finals for the first time since the 1960s.[13] Cavan won and, because of the COVID-19 pandemic, went straight into the All-Ireland SFC semi-final, the county's first appearance at that stage since 1997.

Current squad

Team as per Cavan vs Dublin in the 2020 All-Ireland SFC semi-final, 5 December 2020

No. Player Position Club
1 Raymond Galligan (c) Goalkeeper Lacken
2 Jason McLoughlin Right Corner Back Shannon Gaels
3 Pádraig Faulkner Full Back Kingscourt Stars
4 Killian Clarke Left Corner Back Shercock
5 Gerry Smith Right Half Back Lavey
6 Ciarán Brady Centre Back Arva
7 Luke Fortune Left Half Back Cavan Gaels
8 Thomas Galligan Midfield Lacken
9 Killian Brady Midfield Mullahoran
10 Martin Reilly Right Half Forward Killygarry
11 Gearóid McKiernan Centre Forward Cavan Gaels
12 Oisín Kiernan Left Half Forward Castlerahan
13 Conor Madden Right Corner Forward Gowna
14 Chris Conroy Full Forward Lavey
15 Conor Smith Left Corner Forward Killygarry
No. Player Position Club
16 Liam Brady Substitute Ramor United
17 Niall Murray Substitute Cavan Gaels
18 Stephen Smith Substitute Crosserlough
19 Oisín Brady Substitute Killygarry
20 Thomas Edward Donohoe Substitute Denn
21 Oisín Pierson Substitute Gowna
22 Stephen Murray Substitute Cavan Gaels
23 Cormac O'Reilly Substitute Mullahoran
24 James Smith Substitute Crosserlough
25 Evaan Fortune Substitute Cavan Gaels
26 Conor Brady Substitute Gowna

Current management team

Players

All-Ireland winning captains

Awards

All Stars

Cú Chulainn Awards

Irish News Ulster All Stars

All-Time All Star Award

Team of the Century and Team of the Millennium

Charlie Gallagher was also named on the Team of the Century of players without an All-Ireland medal.

Other Notable Players

Team sponsorship

The following is a list of sponsors of the Cavan county football team (seniors):

  • 1992: Holybrook Construction
  • 1993: Atlanta Conservatories
  • 1994: Cavan Co-op Mart
  • 1995–present: Kingspan Group

Cavan has had only four sponsorship deals since the GAA first permitted sponsors on jerseys in 1991. There was no sponsorship on GAA jerseys until the second game of the Meath v Dublin four-in-a-row in 1991 so only a handful of teams had sponsorship in 1991. In 1992, Holybrook Construction sponsored Cavan's jerseys, although it was only for one game. For the 1993–94 seasons, Cavan Co-op Mart took over sponsorship. Kingspan has continuously sponsored Cavan since 1995.

Honours
Main article: Cavan GAA Honours

Cavan has won the All-Ireland Football final on 5 occasions – all five victories came between 1933 and 1952. Meanwhile, the county has won the Ulster Championship on 40 occasions. All bar the 39th and 40th of these came in the 1960s or earlier. The most recent one came in 2020 after a gap of 23 years. The previous one came in 1997 when Cavan defeated Derry by a scoreline of 1–14 to 0–16. It was the county's first Ulster title in 28 years. Cavan has won the National Football League once, in 1947–48.

References
  1. "Seán Moran: Old road maps of drive for five for Dublin to ponder". The Irish Times. 9 January 2019.
  2. "1947: The Fairytale in New York". Irish Independent. 17 September 2010. Retrieved 19 December 2020.
  3. "FLASHBACK: The team who put Cavan back on the map". The Anglo-Celt. 29 April 2020.
  4. Keys, Colm (5 December 2020). "Cavan fever". Irish Independent.
  5. "McHugh quits to put family first". The Irish Times. 29 August 1997.
  6. "Cavan advance to Ulster decider". RTÉ. 24 June 2001.
  7. "Tyrone triumph in thriller as battling Cavan falter at finish". Irish Independent. 9 July 2001.
  8. "Cavan win could signal end for Boylan". RTÉ. 17 July 2005.
  9. "Cavan survive despite defeat". Irish Independent. 9 April 2012.
  10. "Grogan gives Offaly that sinking feeling". Irish Independent. 9 April 2012.
  11. https://www.sportsjoe.ie/gaa/cavan-appoint-mickey-graham-new-manager-173738
  12. "Cavan appoint Mickey Graham as new manager ahead of return to Division One". Irish Independent. 21 August 2018.
  13. "Ulster SFC: Cavan comeback floors Down". Hogan Stand. 15 November 2020.
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