Cian O'Sullivan
By John Harrington
Cian O’Sullivan has warned that this golden era for Dublin football won’t last forever.
They’ve won three of the last five All-Ireland titles, strung four National League titles together in a row, and are hot favourites to make it back to back All-Ireland titles this year.
They might look unstoppable right now, but O’Sullivan believes history proves that every successful team has a finite life-cycle.
“It's a great time to be playing football with Dublin but we're conscious that it won't last forever,” he said. “These things come in ebbs and flows and teams have their peaks and troughs, Armagh in the early noughties, Tyrone teams...and Tyrone are definitely not gone, they're as strong as ever this year, and you see Kerry winning a rake of All-Irelands in the noughties.
“We've won three in the last five years which is absolutely outstanding but it's a great time to be playing football for Dublin and I'm very fortunate to be around and playing but we're very conscious of the bad days we've had behind and they're a constant reminder of the reality of sport and the reality that there's no guarantees."
Dublin have won 10 of the last 11 Leinster titles and are 100-1 on red-hot favourites to beat Westmeath in Sunday’s Provincial Final. Their dominance has leached much of the drama out of the Leinster Championship, but don’t expect the Dublin players to apologise for that.
"That's not something that the players would think about or concern themselves with,” said O’Sullivan. “Our aim every year going out is to be the best Dublin team we can be and to be competitive and try to get to an All-Ireland final. And if we can get there, to try and win it.
“If that means playing whoever along the way then so be it, that's what we have to do to get there. That's our goal. For us, the players, we're told where to play, we're told who to play against and we go out and play. We wouldn't get overly concerned with how competitive or uncompetitive some provinces are.
"You don't concern yourself with the bookies, the odds or anything. If you're going down that road you're on a completely different page. We try and cocoon ourselves and keep everything within the team bubble."
Dublin celebrate their 2015 All-Ireland Final victory.
It’s a testament to the professionalism of the Dublin players that they never seem to suffer from complacency in these Leinster Championship ties ever though they’re expected to win every game they play in the province comfortably. O’Sullivan admits it requires a lot of focus to keep your edge when everyone is telling you that you’ll win easily.
"Yeah it is,” he said. “The difficult thing is not listening to friends and family. They'll talk to you and they'll say things to you about winning at the weekend. And you try and shut that out. But the biggest hurdle is actually being conscious of that, that these guys are in a different space to us at the moment. We know the reality of what we need to do and that's what matters.
“It doesn't matter what the newspapers are saying, what the pundits are saying or what the bookies are saying. We know what we want to do and what we want to achieve from this game and it's important to stay in that mind-frame, not allowing yourself to get caught up in the media and what everyone else is saying. It is difficult, shutting away from newspapers, from social media and all that stuff.
"There are some guys who can deal with it easily and there are some guys who can't. There are some who can read the paper and subsequently throw all that stuff out and if they're comfortable doing that so be it. But there are other guys who recognise that subconsciously that stuff will feed in. I suppose everyone is different and it's just about recognising what works and what doesn't work.”
