'If we went any lower, we'd have fallen out the bottom of the Celt'

Colour view

There’s a party starting in Roslea. In the middle of the pitch, the players are chanting. Supporters surround them in a circle. In the biting cold, it feels like a single warm embrace.

Hugh Hourican walks past, tears streaming down his cheeks. There’s Niall Brady; here’s Brian Ellis. Many others we know and don’t know but all Arva through and through. And this group of players has brought them all together on a small patch of grass, as one.

At the height of the din, Arva’s full-back broke away from the crowd for a moment.

“Water, anyone have water?” asked James Morris, his voice raised, eyes scanning the ground for a discarded bottle. The cup now won, the adrenaline is waning and the effects of the battle were starting, maybe, to kick in.

A Garda, Morris had patrolled his beat with his usual authority and played it the way he always has, hard and fair. We asked him how it felt and, in an instant, a life in football, minding the house, flashed before his eyes. Looking around at what felt like a rooftop celebration, his thoughts wandered back. Morris was there on the ground floor – maybe even the basement.

During the week, in the build-up to the game, someone had asked him when he and his twin brother Peter had started playing senior football. He had to think about that one.

“I had to look back on it, I didn’t actually know. It was 2007. When we started playing, myself, Peter, Thomas Brady, we were at the very bottom of Cavan football. I remember an ex-manager telling us that if we went any lower, we’d fall out of the bottom of the Celt,” he smiled.

“That’s not messing. It took us a long time to get to where we did, 2013, 2014… There’s just a great group of fellas there who drive the thing on.”

Back then, it’s true, Arva were in the gutter and the stars seemed barely visible through the clouds. In 2008, they beat Corlough in a replay in the first round of the Junior Championship; the Morris brothers came on the next day as they lost to Shannon Gaels. Out early, the autumn spent watching the neighbouring clubs advance. Gowna were in the Cavan senior final in ’07 when Killeshandra won the Junior; Carrigallen were in the Leitrim senior final in ’08; Colmcille won the Longford senior final the same year. Arva were nowhere.

It would take five years to even make a Junior Championship final, which they lost to Kill Shamrocks. They persevered. By then, the team was led by a band of talented young players who had come through successful Cavan underage sides, a special group.

In 2014, the long-awaited day arrived. Thomas Brady was captain and James Morris was Man of the Match in that final against Ballymachugh. How did Morris play it? You can imagine how, even if you can’t remember.

“The full-back turned in a whole-hearted and solid display, fielding well and providing great leadership,” reckoned the report on these pages.

To describe his performance on Saturday, a cut-and-paste job from his first final would do.

It’s quite something that nine years on, seven of that team started again – the Morrises, the Bradys, Kevin Bouchier, Conal Sheridan and Johnny McCabe. Through highs and lows, they’ve backboned the team.

More riches followed after that 2014 success – an Intermediate final, then a win in that grade in 2016 saw them complete the rise from junior to senior but a fiendish draw – Castlerahan, Cavan Gaels, Lavey, Ramor and then Gowna in a relegation play-off – resulted in relegation.

“We had been on a long journey,” was how Ciaran Brady recalled it in an interview a few years ago.

“We were four years getting to county finals. Four county finals in a row. And then the fifth year was the first year in the Senior Championship and I suppose even though we're a young team, we had clocked up a lot of mileage.”

Those miles only go in one direction and for the last few years, the engine was spluttering. Emigration and injuries intervened and Arva found themselves, not a footnote at the bottom of the paper again but back in junior and, fair to say, a long way from the headlines.

A loss to Drumlane in last year’s final prompted lots of soul-searching. When Finbar O’Reilly came in in the winter, he said, he detected hurt.

Could they go again? They delivered their answer in the county championship and, the Sean Leddy Cup secured, Ulster beckoned.

While, they wouldn’t admit it publicly and risk being seen to disrespect opposition in the county, privately, some have said a crack at a provincial title was referenced in the group from the outset.

Bouchier hinted at as much in the raucous aftermath. The centre-forward talks how he plays – measured and smart.

“It probably doesn’t feel as exciting as the first one,” he said, keeping things in check, “purely because we aimed for big things this year.”

O’Reilly, the manager, echoed that.

“We knew this day was possible but it’s hard to get here. But we got here… This team has designs on doing good things. We’ll take it one step at a time but we’re definitely not finished.”

With two titles secured, Arva are now like a day-tripper coming down the North Circular Road – all of a sudden, Croke Park is visible, towering on the skyline. Arva, in Croker. Imagine that.

“We’re playing the UK champions, Wandsworth Gaels, Damien McCaul from Killeshandra is in the goals for them. We’ll not be taking anything for granted, we’ll be pushing on,” James Morris said.

“I’m actually getting married New Year’s Eve myself, the week after that is an All-Ireland semi-final so that will be our goal, to get to that.”

For now, they’ll enjoy this. At the centre of it all was Ciaran Brady, sporting a scrawny ‘Movember’ tache. The last time he was spotted wearing one of those, he won an Ulster Championship with Cavan. Maybe it brought him luck. Or maybe he made his own.

He had played the ultimate selfless game – he took countless hits and kept going forward.

It was instantly apparent that his was one of those extraordinary performances which will be talked about in his club for generations.

“It wouldn’t be a final without two teams,” he said in his speech, complimenting the opposition.

“We knew we were going to have to go the distance to wear them off and that was the way it went.”

“You have been worthy champions before, Blackhill, but I suppose our time with Arva is now…”

The moment had come and up went the cup, with a war cry.

“Rise her, Arva!”

And rise it they did - and have always done.