IRELAND AMPUTEE TEAM TO COMPETE AT THE HOME OF IRISH FOOTBALL THIS WEEKEND

International football returns to the Home of Irish Football this Friday when the Ireland Amputee team host neighbours England at Dalymount Park in the first game of a three-team tournament at 7.45pm.

On Saturday, the tournament continues as Poland play England at noon followed by Ireland taking on Poland at 4pm.

Admission to all three games is FREE.

It caps a breakthrough year for the sport in Ireland following the establishment of the Irish Amputee Football Association National League.

A veteran of the game, Chris McElligott has been a leading light behind the growth of amputee football in Ireland – as both a player and a coach – and was the key man behind the establishment of the league.

He said: “This year has been fantastic. I couldn’t have dreamed of where amputee football is going at the moment.

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Neil Hoey 2/5/2018

Leading The Line

AN INTERVIEW WITH DINNY CORCORAN

Up to last Friday, a vital injury-time winner in an early six-pointer against Bray Wanderers had been the highlight of an injury-hit season so far for talismanic Bohemian striker Dinny Corcoran.

But a late two-goal salvo at Richmond Park has surely surpassed that as Dinny rescued a deserved point for Bohs in the derby with St Patrick’s Athletic on Friday. His second goal deep in injury-time was first credited to Keith Buckley and then in most media to Kevin Devaney. But among the lads and the Bohs management, the goal is definitely going to Dinny Corcoran!

“It was great to get something out of the game,” he beams, “especially after a dismal first half. It was brilliant to get on the scoresheet. The second goal definitely hit my leg. I thought it might have hit someone after that but I watched it back for the first time on Sunday and it looks like it goes straight in. So I’ll try to claim it!”

To be fair, you could not begrudge the big man a bit of better fortune after an injury-plagued pre-season has left him behind the rest in terms of fitness and sharpness. The 29-year-old has found the going a bit tougher. But as the saying goes, form is temporary, class is permanent.

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It’s relatively early doors yet and as soon as Dinny regains full fitness for the cut and thrust of Premier Division football, normal service in front of goal will no doubt resume regularly as it did last Friday.

The Donabate man first joined the club in 2012 from Drogheda United when Aaron Callaghan enticed him to the red and black. He was to score four times that season in 21 appearances in what was a very difficult campaign for the club.

His second spell at Dalymount in 2014, when he scored 13 goals in 27 games under Owen Heary, secured him hero status among the Bohemian faithful. He backed that up last term when he rejoined from St. Patrick’s Athletic notching another 16 goals in 25 appearances in a stellar fifth place finish.

He sees plenty of reasons to be positive despite Bohs’ rather precarious position in the table. Performances have been good but tight battles have been lost. No team has played through us, he feels, and once the commitment and passion is retained, he has no doubt we will begin to climb the table.

As always Bohs fans have been very understanding and encouraging but at the same time, very few know of the trials and tribulations that he has been dealing with over the close season and early weeks of the league campaign.

“Yes the fans have been brilliant to me as always. That’s been a huge plus actually. There have been there for the team week in, week out and have got behind us no matter what.

“On a personal note, no disrespect to any of the clubs I’ve been at, but the Bohs fans are the best I’ve played for. I feel they’ve been with me all the way, through the good times and the bad.

“I love getting the texts and messages after a game when I’ve scored but let me tell you, you appreciate them even more when you’ve had a bad game or lately when I’ve been injured. They’re always there to encourage you rather than dish out a slating.”

THE START OF THINGS

Dinny’s niggling injury is in a tendon in his groin, a frustrating knock that has been stubborn in its refusal to clear up. Innocuous enough at the time, it has dogged his winter preparations and pre-seasoon, something he is still paying the price for now as he approaches full fitness again.

“It happened in the off-season when a few of us were having a workout on astroturf to keep fit, Bohs players and a few I’d know well from other clubs. I did something to my groin but I didn’t think it was anything serious. It was sore and I took a few days off from running to recover.

“I thought that was the end of the matter but when we started back into pre-season training it flared up again. Pre-season is very intense, as you’d expect, and I felt it go again. I had a scan which revealed bad inflammation in a tendon in the groin.

“It didn’t need an op but it did need rest and management. But it kept recurring. I’d rest it, train for a day or two and then I’d be out for a few days. To be honest, it has left me four or five weeks behind the rest of the lads when it comes to fitness levels.”

ON THE MEND

For a player so used to playing and so used to being a central figure in the team, it has been a bit of a nightmare for him.

“Yes it has been so frustrating as I feel I have a lot more to give,” he says. “I haven’t trained or played as much as I needed to so you feel a bit sluggish. The problem is that midfielders and defenders are all about endurance, long distance running, stamina.

“As a striker, it’s all about short bursts of pace and getting beyond your man, quick movements and anticipation. And that is exactly what the groin was preventing me from doing. The darting runs and quick accelerations that being a striker is all about were not possible for me in pre-season.

“I’d get through a session well enough but the next day it used to be killing me so I’d have to miss a few days’ training. In that regime, it’s very hard to build up your core strength. In hindsight I should have rested it more, managed it better. But when your first game of the season is home to Shamrock Rovers, it’s a hard thing to do to give up on playing in it! Who sits out Rovers?

“It’s been horrible to miss sessions and watch lads play matches but it’s all forgotten now, I’m nearly there!

“In my previous two campaigns at the club, I’ve hit the ground running and started scoring early,” he continues, “but I haven’t been fit enough or sharp enough to do that this time. The confidence does take a hit, but I know continued hard work will change my luck soon. I just need a run of games once I am fully fit to get that confidence going again.”

The good news is that Dinny feels he is well on the mend and not too far off being in the condition he wants to be in. St Patrick’s Athletic can bear testimony to that!

“It’s better now, it’s not giving me any bother. But it has been tough because I have been short on training and games so now I need to keep catching up and getting the match sharpness back. I’m getting fitter every week and hopefully I’ll be back to last season’s levels very soon.”

OFF THE MARK

That winner against Bray reminded us of what he is really all about, a goal that gave him as much satisfaction and relief as any he has scored in the red and black.

“Yes scoring against Bray was huge, more so because it was a vital game we had to win, not just because it was my first goal. The first one can be the hardest to get! I’d like to have kicked on but my body wasn’t quite ready to let me.

“Luckily there is still a long way to go for me to get back into the side, make my mark on the team and cement my place. Last week was a very important game for me and as a striker, goals are what you are all about. It’s been hard with all of the two-game weeks, any player trying to recover from an injury would relate to that I think.

“I certainly wouldn’t use it as any class of excuse for the team. We have players good enough to win any game and we know better than anyone that we should have more points on the board. It’s just been tough for me personally as I am trying to get my sharpness back and the games have come a bit too thick and fast for me.

“We have played very well and been very unfortunate not to have more points.. We’ve produced good football but a few silly mistakes and poor finishing have cost us dearly. There’s no cause for panic though, I honestly think we are improving as the games pass.

“I believe our luck will change as we will force it to by continuing to play good stuff and retaining the work ethic we have shown. Good football or not, we know it is a results business though The Rovers wins were fantastic and it’s hard to say why we haven’t got results like that more often.

“But the team is full of character – there we were in Tallaght battling to the end with our left-full up in the box after 99 minutes!”

GOING TO THE WELL

In our league games thus far, up to and including the 2-2 draw at Richmond last Friday, Bohs have only been ahead for 18 minutes of the season. It seems incredible but it’s true.

Falling behind as often as we have has given the team a lot to do.

“It is a pity as I think that if we could be more solid and take the lead I think we’d be hard to pin back,” Dinny agrees.

“It is hard chasing games every week, sometimes against solid teams like Cork and Dundalk. We keep giving ourselves a lot to do like at St Pat’s. We have to change that as we are playing well enough to have taken a lot more than 13 points.”

Add in the fact that Dinny and his partner Leighanne have been blessed with a baby, 17-month-old Freddy, who gives Dinny a thorough daily workout and a meaner man-marking job than any league centre-half, and his whole life has been turned on its head this past year!

But he says he wouldn’t change any of it for the world and is at last smiling again after these tough few injury hit months.

“It’s been some change all right, at the click of a finger! My football has been going great too at the club before this injury and as I said earlier, the support of the fans has been immense for me. I just need to play to get back to where I was last year and reward their faith in me with a few goals.”

St Patrick's Athletic v Bohemians - SSE Airtricity League Premier Division

“We had camoflage on our faces and my Mam was just looking at me wondering what was going on”

Ahead of the big kick-off against Shamrock Rovers at Dalymount Park on February 16, Bohemians midfielder Oscar Brennan takes bohemianfc.com behind the scenes as the team and management prepare for the 2018 season.

This is the fourth and final instalment of Oscar’s pre-season diary.

Picture the scene; Dinny Corcoran is skinning a rabbit, Dan Casey is down by the river gutting a fish and somewhere in the forest Kev Devaney and Jamie Hamilton are foraging for fire-wood on a wet day in the Wicklow mountains.

Welcome to pre-season, 2018.

The weather was horrendous, rain, sleet and bitterly.

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We’ve been working hard on the pitch and in the gym, but last Saturday week we were taken out of our comfort zone at Basecamp East, about 15 minutes beyond Enniskerry.

It was a tough day, it wasn’t about fitness but team-work and bonding.

We arrived at 9.30am for a 9.50 start and as soom as the army lads came up over the hill they were screaming at us, screaming at Detser (Derek Pender) to get us in line. As the captain, that was his job. Otherwise we were down for 10 press-ups.

It was serious, they replicated what life was like in the army for us.

We were trekking with these big, massive bags up and down hills, treading through ice-cold rivers and then we’d to set up our own camps.

We were given these sheets to attach to trees, we’d to skin a rabbit and a fish – at least we didn’t have to catch them!

We didn’t eat in the end, we couldn’t get the fire started.

They just said ‘that’s the reality of army life, if you don’t get it started you don’t eat.

You’re so tired by the end of it, the army lads were putting pressure on purposely to see how you react.

There was no room for whinging and moaning, if you just looked at them everyone was down for 10 press ups and what was worse was if you were the one who caused the press-ups, you didn’t do them, you counted them out for everyone else just so everyone hated you that little bit more.

We realised quickly enough after some shock treatment, Detser just had a word and said: ‘look,lads, today is not going to be fun. Just get on with it and let’s just get through it’.

It was a long day, I couldn’t even speak when I got home I was that drained. We had camoflage on our faces and my Mam was just looking at me wondering what was going on.

Detser went and picked one of his kids up from their gymnastics class and the whole class stopped and was looking at the fella with the camo on his face.

You go through what we took out of that day and the skills that are transferable from army life into football – team-work, motivation, trust, leadership and what you would want from the person beside you if you were going to war with them.

Oscar Brennan

“People don’t see that side of it, they’re coming from work and have families”

<blockquote>Ahead of the big kick-off against Shamrock Rovers at Dalymount Park on February 16, Bohemians midfielder Oscar Brennan takes bohemianfc.com behind the scenes as the team and management prepare for the 2018 season.

This is the third instalment of Oscar’s pre-season diary.</blockquote>

People might have a picture in their head of pre-season of lads doing endless laps, but the modern strength and conditioning coaches have changed all of that.

There’s a science behind everything. That’s great for us, if you ask Cian McCaffrey, our strength and conditioning coach, why we’re doing something he’ll be able to tell you – ‘this is how this relates to a match scenario’.

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Cian comes in on a Monday and Thursday and before we go out on the pitch we do prehab, injury prevention work.

Players will be on foam-rollers, doing walk-out press-ups, planks side-planks and a lot of lads who’ve been in the league a while find that bit hard.

They might be used to the old-school stuff, it’s harder than it looks – you’re trying to hold yourself up against your body weight.

If you’ve been doing prehab, then it’s straight into training.

If Cian’s not there, it’s up to lads themselves and we’ll do our prehab, Cian’s been there the last year and we know what the exercises are. We’re not babies.

Trevor and Keith are there so early, they’ve everything set-up when you get there.

People don’t see that side of it, they’re coming from work and have families but no matter how early you show up to training they’re there.

They’re not sitting around the changing-room like us, chatting and messing, they’re out on the pitch setting up, they’ve prepared the sessions weeks in advance.

We start with a circle, start with ‘Rondos’ with two lads playing piggy in the middle.

That gets you a touch of the ball, it’s usually a bit of a laugh and then we go into our warm-ups and the session goes from there.

It’s even enough, we put the two young lads in first. The two youngest guys last year are happy out because there are a few new faces and they’ve moved up the food chain a bit.

Wardy is probably the best at it, he has all of these little tricks. Rob Cornwall and Dan Casey struggle the most – two meat-head centre-halves, they haven’t a clue!

Oscar Brennan

“There’s no messing – you’re up and early”

Ahead of the big kick-off against Shamrock Rovers at Dalymount Park on February 16, Bohemians midfielder Oscar Brennan takes bohemianfc.com behind the scenes as the team and management prepare for the 2018 season.

This is the second instalment of Oscar’s pre-season diary.

We need to reach a level of fitness that we can maintain over the course of the year.

We train on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday.

Saturday mornings, you’re in the gym at 6.45 for a 7am start, so there’s no messing – you’re up and early.

Most of the lads like that, because you have your weekend then.

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Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday we’re out on the pitch at 6pm. You can’t make anyone do anything, but it’s standards, it’s expected that you go to the gym, that you eat well and look after yourself.

It’s a 24/7 thing, it’s not just the contact-hours, especially the responsibility is with us as players.

If you’re in England the gym is on sight, the canteen is just there, you’re not going to work or rushing in and out – there’s people there constantly to help.

We do have people constantly helping us at Bohs, Cian McCaffrey our strength and conditioning coach, if you ask him for anything he’d help you with it.

He gives lads use of his gym. he’d go through 1-1 sessions with lads if you get out at the right time but the responsibility does lie with us.

It’s good, it forces us to take ownership of the team, we’re the players. It’s the fans’ club, but it’s us on the pitch and we have to take responsibility for that.

There’s a good mix to the work we do in the gym and it’s not a case of us doing the same work all season.

We had a seven week off-season programme with four different gym sessions across two blocs, meaning he split the off-season into two groups.

Bloc 1, we were doing the first and second bits of the programme on Mondays and Fridays and then, after four weeks, you did gym sessions three and four.

You’re alternating all the time.

You just go in and it’s very general, you do a warm-up which is mainly body-weight stuff like walk-out press-ups, then you go into the weighted stuff – its not all weights, there are chin-ups and press-ups and the resistance bands – pushing and pulling with them and then we finish with cardio.

If it’s the Saturday morning after a match, it’s usually just the lads who didn’t play who do extra. We’ll use the battle-ropes or boxing against the pads, 20 seconds on and then 20 seconds off.

It’s nearly harder for the pad-man, because he’s doing 20 seconds of burpees when you’re resting and he still has to take the punches which is hard as well!!

We use the prowler as well, which is heavy and you’re pushing at 100%.

It’s mixed, he’ll do something different the next time.

The exercises kind of change, but the structure stays the same.

We do a lot of injury prevention stuff, which is massive these days.

It’s about maintaining the body, especially this year when there’s so many mid-week games – we’ll be playing Friday – Monday – Friday a lot of the time. That’s just the league.
Once the League Cup fixtures are announced, we’ve the Leinster Senior Cup to fit in, it’s all about maintenance during the season.

You’re getting your gains in the off-season and pre-season.

Oscar Brennan
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