IN 2009 Aidan O’Shea began his maiden summer with the Mayo seniors as a Leaving Certificate student. His mind was a typical teenage jumble of dreams and hopes, but he had the lyrical ability to sort it all out and write it all down. The Irish Times gave him a column as their Leaving Cert exam diarist. What followed was nine days of humour, imagination and unkempt ambition.
Sample Line No 1 on preparing for the French exam: “I will dabble in a little French vocab this evening, just a light splash, like eau de cologne. Some postcard lingo of the ‘wish you were here variety.’”
Sample LineNo 2, on nailing Irish: “I’m almost afraid to tell you how early I left the exam hall. Well, actually it’s not you I’m afraid of, it’s my mother. Let’s just say I got home in time for Murder, She Wrote.”
Adventures In Writing, Journey 1: Michael Longley’s poem Badger, merged with a Lions Test: “Stephen Ferris and the 75m sprint (‘his path straight and narrow, and not like the fox’s zig-zags), Hook diving to the ground for the try in the dying minutes (‘manages the earth with his paws, returns underground to die’).”
Adventures in Writing, Journey 2 — a Sam Cooke inspired ode to the Leaving Cert: “I don’t know much about history, but my best mate’s hands are all blistery.”
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He wanted to win an All-Ireland with Mayo that summer. He wanted to study business in DCU in the autumn. His articles sketched and coloured a portrait of someone bursting to become something.
Once the exams were over O’Shea launched headlong into the championship with Mayo. He was already 6ft 5in and built like an armoured car, and sallied to a Connacht title swatting away ornery old full-backs like wasps.
“What surprised me was how good a footballer he actually was,” says Aidan Kilcoyne, who played alongside O’Shea in the full-forward line. “He was so big you’d think his size was his big strength, but he was a really good ball player, able to take a score. He had great vision. He knew when to play a pass and he was very unselfish. Those skills and traits are what people are speaking about now.”
Then came August. O’Shea was backing writing about exam results. He had fallen short of making business in DCU. Meath had taken out Mayo in the All-Ireland quarter-final. “This is a strange and unsettling place to be,” he wrote. “I’ve gone from being the busiest man in Ireland to sitting around, twiddling my thumbs with no idea what to do next. I was doing my Leaving Cert, training for All-Ireland glory, and writing a column for The Irish Times. Now once I’m finished writing this column, I have no idea what I’m going to do next.”
Reality had left its first teethmarks on him. A year later, O’Shea was on the bench as Mayo drifted down a cul-de-sac and lost to Sligo and Longford. He was a thoroughbred full-forward but Mayo hadn’t the players to exploit that and he had a mind himself to play elsewhere.
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When it came up in conversation O’Shea always preferred centre-forward, drifting back into the middle. His neighbour, Martin Carney had watched O’Shea jump from boy to man mountain without pausing in between. He also gathered stats for John O’Mahony as O’Shea first made his way with Mayo. The same debate drew him in back then. “I’d still feel he’s a midfielder with responsibility to cover back around centre-back,” he says. “He has the intelligence, skill and awareness to do that.”
“I don’t think it surprised anybody that he went outfield,” says Kilcoyne. “It was more surprising that he went back in. But Pat Holmes and Noel Connelly were in a no-lose situation. They had such an embarrassment of riches at centrefield, why not try him in there?”
The devastation O’Shea has wreaked on defences since going back to full-forward thsi year is the most visible impact of a journey that has diverted a good player toying with becoming great onto the road that can take him there. His talent was never in question. Neither was his ability and willingness to lead. One day in the League against Down O’Shea was sent off after nine minutes but had already forced four turnovers and made an industrial quantity of successful tackles. He has often risen to the top of Mayo’s tackle count without many noticing and his size has always overshadowed a neat line in footwork and quick acceleration.
The way he plays football, the way he can rouse and inflame his own crowd, the battle to blend his innate confidence with more consistency; every part is pure Mayo. He occupies the same folk space as Willie Joe Padden before him, capable of rousing teams and stadiums with great moments of gaisce. But to win All-Irelands and bring the best out of him, Mayo have always needed more. Much more.
“He’s not an arrogant person,” says Carney, “he’s got good football arrogance. On the field he’s very confident and that confidence transmits to others. When he goes out the field he’s not afraid to lead and take responsibility. It’s a good overall package, and that innate confidence is a huge plus.”
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Becoming what he is right now demanded more of him. After he took over in 2011 James Horan started using O’Shea away from full-forward and eventually erased that option from the playbooks.
By the 2012 All-Ireland final against Donegal he was anchored at centrefield beside his brother Seamus. Moving him back to full-forward when Mayo chased the game wasn’t even something they had rehearsed.
Finding the balance between encouraging and challenging O’Shea was tricky. His strength and conditioning work was always good. Some years it could have been better. He suffered injuries and suspensions that interrupted his flow. His in-game intelligence and skill set were sharp enough to illuminate any game but operating from centrefield meant his staying power was sometimes a problem. He always wanted to be a leader, but to truly fit into the selfless mood of the group around him, he first needed to confront the weaker elements of his game he thought he didn’t need.
“If you look at the Mayo team in general, the nucleus is from the under-21 team that won the 2006 All-Ireland,” says Carney. “Most of these lads were on the team beaten by Sligo and Longford in 2010. It took them four or five years to develop into the footballers they’ve become. Aidan has also come to that point. He’s a few years out of under-21, playing the best football of his life. A number of variables have come together: his experience, his strength and conditioning work, skillwork, they’ve all coalesced at the right time.”
Having taken over from Horan Pat Holmes and Noel Connelly prodded a few different buttons with him this year. They had already pulled some towering displays from O’Shea at centre-forward with the Mayo under-21s in 2009 before he went hunting with the seniors at full-forward. This spring they told him to get ready for a few different positions. There would be the odd day at centrefield. Other days he would flit between centre and full-forward.
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All that obliged him to get sharper and work harder. He ended last year in a mess of blood and tears, swaying down the tunnel in Limerick after defeat to Kerry concussed after a collision with Cillian O’Connor, devastated by defeat. That night was the final push.
Players have noticed him sharper and fitter. After years emptying himself around centrefield, he has been able to unleash his energy from full-forward in more concentrated bursts. He is demanding the ball. His shooting is better. The small mechanics of his game that added up into the catch, shimmy, sharp feet and delicate finish for his goal against Donegal a few weeks have all been improved. There is a sense of liberation about him. One day during the club championship he hammered in a hat-trick for Breaffy against Ballyhaunis and created two more goals all inside 10 minutes. It was joyous, uncontainable stuff. It is the nature of this generation of Mayo players not to leave any player unsupported, out on his own. But O’Shea will lead them today from the front, sword and shield glinting. It’s what he wants.
What Mayo want.