Sport

Brendan Crossan: Michael McCann's return to the fold will help Antrim's promotion drive

Cargin's Mick McCann has returned to Antrim after a three-year absence Picture: Seamus Loughran
Cargin's Mick McCann has returned to Antrim after a three-year absence Picture: Seamus Loughran Cargin's Mick McCann has returned to Antrim after a three-year absence Picture: Seamus Loughran

“If you don’t give the ball away, you’ll be fine.” – Cian Mackey

THE text message dropped around 10.30am on Wednesday morning. ‘Mick McCann is back on the Antrim panel.’

In Antrim circles, this is fairly big news.

It’s big news because Mick McCann has been arguably the best player in the county over the last 10 years. Definitely the best player to wear the county jersey since Sean Kelly of St Gall’s.

Kelly and McCann neatly fit into the thoroughbred category.

They don’t make players like McCann and Kelly any more.

Maybe the pair were just born good players. Or maybe the emphasis of modern-day coaching is all wrong.

You would like to think if McCann and Kelly were coming through the ranks today they would still operate outside the prevailing coaching monolith.

In other words, they would still be independent thinkers on the field of play; that they could problem-solve, be instinctive and be able to make more good decisions with the football than bad.

I interviewed Cian Mackey a few weeks back after he announced his retirement from the inter-county scene.

Mackey was a one-off. An artisan. A problem-solver, a player who always thought for himself and a puzzle to the opposition.

He revealed that he was more nervous doing fitness tests than before playing in big Championship games.

Mackey, who left the inter-county stage aged 32, mightn’t have been clocking up the GPS stats as some of his younger team-mates but he could still affect games by sheer brain power.

“If your system is not working you need to be able to do something a wee bit different,” Mackey said.

“You can lose a game in 30 minutes because something’s not working and you can’t wait until half-time for Mickey Graham to tell you what to do.”

The vast majority of people who watched the Antrim Senior Football Championship in 2018 and 2019 would have regarded Mick McCann as the competition’s best player.

Technically gifted, great hands, great feet, composure, always progressive in possession, the Cargin man could play anywhere.

When Lenny Harbinson took the Antrim reins it was a no-brainer to invite McCann back onto the panel.

But the demanding training schedule ruled him out of a possible return to county duty.

Two years ago, he told The Irish News: “Lenny sent me [the training schedule] through and there wasn't even a question. I just said no chance, couldn't do it.

“They were training three nights a week in Belfast between Monday and Friday, and then Saturday and Sunday every weekend.”

McCann is 34, but it was never the creeping years that kept him away. It was simply the time commitments.

His younger brother Tomas couldn’t return for the same reasons. Both are not back on board.

Harbinson is nothing but pragmatic. When he guided his club St Gall’s to the 2010 All-Ireland title he placed great value on experience and know-how.

Veterans Sean Burns and Mark McCrory were past their primes and while their game-time was limited that year, Harbinson regarded their knowledge as an essential element in the St Gall’s effort.

Players like Burns and McCrory set the tone and behaviour of the changing room.

Younger members of the squad looked up to them. Burns and McCrory were the manager’s eyes and ears and the enforcers of discipline.

With two failed attempts to get out of Division Four, Harbinson has gone for a different approach this year.

The squad has cut down on its training sessions.

Rather than have a separate night for their gym work, it’s now done on Tuesday and Thursday nights. As a consequence, the sessions are longer but it means the management team has been able to entice some older players back to the county set-up.

Family and work commitments effectively ruled the McCann brothers and Paddy Cunningham out of the inter-county equation. The trio have all young kids.

But the fact that they’re at home on a Wednesday night and not in the gym has paved the way back for them.

Make no mistake: Antrim are right in the middle of their Championship campaign at this moment.

The Ulster Championship and Tier Two will look after themselves in the summer.

What matters more than anything is gaining promotion into Division Three this spring.

Tomas, Mick and Paddy Cunningham mightn’t clock up the same amount of miles as their 22 and 23-year-old team-mates.

In GPS terms, they won’t be at the top of the class and they mightn’t be able to play at full capacity for 70-plus minutes.

But they will enhance Antrim’s promotion prospects because of their game intelligence.

Their decision-making alone in the final third of the field could be the difference between finishing first or second or third or fourth.

Six years away from the inter-county scene, Cunningham has already shown that he can still weigh in with game-winning tallies.

Injury has prevented Tomas McCann making an impression in Division Four so far but he’s nearing full fitness ahead of Antrim’s four remaining NFL games against Carlow, Limerick, Wicklow and Waterford.

There are not many better composed finishers in Antrim right now than Tomas McCann, allied to the quality that already exists in the squad.

It’ll be hard to find a more motivated trio in Division Four in 2020.

It was a bit of a throwaway line from Mackey last month, but it’s the truth.

“If you don’t give the ball away, you’ll be fine.”