Rory Grugan during an Armagh Media Conference ahead of the GAA Football All-Ireland Senior Championship Final at the Carrickdale Hotel in Dundalk, Louth. Photo by Harry Murphy/Sportsfile
By John Harrington
As the final few frantic seconds of extra-time played out in Armagh’s All-Ireland SFC semi-final victory over Kerry, Rory Grugan hid his head behind Aidan Forker and silently begged David Gough to blow the final whistle.
The two of them were standing on the steps to the substitute’s seats in the Hogan stand, their own huge contribution to Armagh’s effort on the day already expended.
When Gough finally did blow that whistle, Grugan experience a surge of emotion he now describes as “a mixture of massive relief and total elation when you're running on to the field at the end. If you could bottle that feeling you'd make a lot of money.”
Armagh were through to an All-Ireland senior football final…this was the moment he’d been dreaming of and working towards since making his debut in the McKenna Cup in 2011.
It’s been a long, winding road and there were a few turns taken for cul de sacs along the way.
Were there times he doubted they’d never make it?
“There's no point saying that at different times you wouldn't have doubted that,” admits Grugan.
“I think that's normal when you've been through difficult days and particularly in the last couple of seasons when we've been at a better level and we've lost really tight games and those penalty scenarios...it would be hard not to have that doubt.
“I suppose if we didn't have total belief in what we were doing the squad wouldn't have stuck together and we wouldn't have had that consistency in our approach. We wouldn't have believed in Geezer the way that we do.
“We knew what we were doing in terms of physical preparation and tactical preparation and I had total belief in what we were doing and we know how fine the margins are.
“That's what kind of kept us going, that belief that your time would come. And it doesn't guarantee you anything. Getting to a final is all well and good but you want to go and win it now.”
At Armagh’s All-Ireland Final media night last week, team manager Kieran McGeeney made a point of highlighting the positive influence that the two players in attendance – Grugan and team-captain Aidan Forker – had on the wider group.
Because of the strength of his own personality the temptation is to give McGeeney the lion’s share of credit for leading Armagh to Sunday’s All-Ireland Final.
Rory Grugan of Armagh and Armagh manager Kieran McGeeney after their side's victory in the GAA Football All-Ireland Senior Championship quarter-final match between Armagh and Roscommon at Croke Park in Dublin. Photo by Harry Murphy/Sportsfile.
But McGeeney was adamant that the standards have been pushed by players like Grugan and Forker who have given huge commitment to the cause during bad times as well as good.
“I suppose as you get that bit older you naturally find yourself in those roles and you probably heard in all high-performance environments now about leadership groups and all that type of stuff,” says Grugan.
“Shared leadership is probably the more modern and effective way of these environments and it's something that Geezer has been very big on from the very start.
“Most coaches you hear now talk about things being player-driven and that you have to hold each other accountable to standards when it comes to how you train, how you represent yourself away from the field, and how you play on the field and that's been no different with us.
“We've got a great management team who all cover different areas of tactical play and they've got their roles and then it's down to us as players. We've got what you could call leadership pods and that's a shared leadership model that I think is working for us.”
Armagh’s story is one of incremental improvement rather than anything transformational.
They have one of the most consistent squads in the country over a long period of time which is why their substitutes are usually proven performers with plenty of championship experience you can rely on to make an impact.
Their penalty shoot-out defeats to Galway (2022), Derry (2023), Monaghan (2023), and Donegal (2024) would have broken the resolve of many teams but instead it looks like Armagh have been fire-hardened by that adversity.
Because when it looked like they might have to endure the mental torture of another penalty shoot-out in All-Ireland semi-final against Kerry they showed they had the bottle to go and win the game in the closing moments of extra-time when Conor Turbitt raced free to put them two ahead.
“Yeah, and, again, the ball flies into the square and only for an amazing piece of fielding by Rian and quick-thinking by Blaine then it could have been heart-break again,” says Grugan.
“So it is such fine margins but the maturity that Turbo showed was massive at that stage because a two-point lead in extra-time...I know it's the cliched dangerous lead, a two-point lead, but it is big. It's hard to score two or three points, especially with such little time left.
“Just chatting about it with Aidan Forker, the fact that myself and him were off the field and the older players were gone and it was left to younger leaders to step up...to Ross McQuillan, to Jarly Óg Burns, to Turbo himself, to Oisin Conaty, Joe McElroy, Niall Grimley, all these lads who are the next bunch behind us older lads in our thirties.
“That's rewarding as well, the fact that we had that trust in our squad to know we had learned the lessons and were going to see it out.”
Rory Grugan of Armagh celebrates after his side's victory in the GAA Football All-Ireland Senior Championship semi-final match between Armagh and Kerry at Croke Park in Dublin. Photo by Seb Daly/Sportsfile.
What sort of impact will the nature of that semi-final win over Kerry have on this Armagh group?
It’s easy to imagine it could give them an adrenalin shot of confidence that will have them primed to really play to their full potential in Sunday’s Final against Galway.
“There's definitely no bad coming from it,” says Grugan. “The lessons learned from difficult defeats in extra time and penalties definitely stood to us. You hope that it comes to a point where you can put an end to that.
“It was running on long enough where it was going to be a bit of a sad story about Armagh losing in extra-time and penalties again. You can imagine how that would hurt you as players and as a team, that you wanted to put that to bed, and I feel like we did that.
“So please God that stands to us and the fact that you're going and beating such a quality team as Kerry with all their history in an All-Ireland semi-final and the first time for us to get to a Final in 21 years, definitely that will give us a lot of confidence in the next two weeks.”