Defence the best form for attacker

Leinster SFC Interview with Colin Moran: Colin Moran's recent change of tack in the Dublin jersey is by no means an unprecedented departure, as he explains to Ian O'Riordan

Every summer brings fresh tales of the unexpected positional switch. Players taking new roles to prolong a career, or harden a team. For Colin Moran the move into the Dublin defence has simply meant retracing his footsteps.

Long before the days of Colin Moran the forward, there were days spent learning the trade of defending. And building the foundations of his career with Dublin. Yet his return to the Dublin left-half back position for the summer was hardly anticipated, and wasn't just a matter of circumstance.

At one level it all appeared to stem from the fourth Sunday in March, with Dublin playing Roscommon at Hyde Park. Paul Casey's leg gives way after eight minutes and in jumps Moran. Surely Tommy Lyons has lost the plot. Moran doesn't play back there any more.

Surprise soon gives way to marvel. Moran tackles hard, defends confidently. Towards the end, with Roscommon chasing a winning goal, he brings Jonathan Dunning to a screeching halt as Dunning races through the penalty area. Roscommon supporters shout for a penalty but in their hearts they know the tackle was fair. And so Moran defines the game.

In the following weeks word came through that Peadar Andrews would be out for the season with a knee injury, and that Coman Goggins was struggling with his form. So fate seemed certain to keep Moran in defence. But what Moran wasn't aware of was that Lyons and the Dublin management had been thinking about playing him there long before events in Roscommon.

"To be honest I didn't see the move coming," says Moran. "Especially not this season. I'd been in the half-forward line for the last three years with Dublin, so I certainly hadn't planned on starting in the defence.

"And I wasn't expecting at all to come in after eight minutes against Roscommon. And then mark a forward. But the first touch or two went alright, and I was able to settle down after that.

"But that was the first time I played at wing back at senior, and it was a bit of a shock to the system. Things just went well enough that day. Then there was the last league game, against Galway, where we needed to get something to stay up, and it worked well enough there again. So I stayed there in all the training games over the last few weeks, and played there against Louth."

The thinking of Lyons and his selectors behind Moran's switch was partly based on his qualifications. When he first emerged from Ballyboden St Enda's on to the Dublin minor team in 1997 he was a defender, mostly playing in the half-back line. Paddy Canning, the then Dublin minor manager and now a senior selector, had plans to move Moran to centre forward, but he was proving so pivotal to their defence at centre back that the move was deferred.

In 1998 he was again defending with the Dublin minor side that lost the Leinster final to Laois, the team that included the likes of Beano McDonald and Colm Parkinson. A year later and his first season with the under-21s - and another year when the team lost out to Laois - there was still no change.

The first turning point came in 2000. He was playing in the forwards with the under-21s when Tom Carr gave him his first senior start, against Westmeath at centre forward. The transition was smooth; the days of defending were quickly forgotten.

What took him back to the defence was Lyons looking to seal up the cracks in his Dublin team for 2003. While Moran was blessed with true scoring ability, there were some question marks about his confidence, which might have been suffering under the responsibilities of playing in the forward line. So Lyons figured that all the talents that allow Moran to stand out as footballer, his swift carriage of the ball and sharp eye for a pass, his intelligent reading of the game and accuracy from the boot, might just work a little better at left-half back. Give him the same licence to go, but just slightly readjust the mindset.

"I suppose at senior level you are going to get punished if you are off your man," says Moran. "At minor level you could compensate a little if you had the pace and strength. But at senior level there is nowhere to hide if you are not tight on your man, and especially at Croke Park.

"So that's really what Tommy has been driving into me at the training games over the last few weeks. He's happy enough, I think, with my distribution, but to work more on the defensive side.

"Although I had played there a lot at underage, over the last three years I was playing a totally different role, and working on different things. Trying to get away from my man, and getting into space. But a lot of the things about playing at wing back came back to me relatively quickly. And like any other position, you are always trying to improve."

In some ways Moran now looks more like a defender. Though just turned 23, he seems near his physical peak, and certainly broader and stronger looking than ever. But his fitness has reached new heights, and well past the levels of last year, when a back injury, finally diagnosed as two cracks in the spine, kept him out of the Dublin training from January to May.

"Once the injury itself was sorted, I then had to go through an intensive programme, just to rebuild the strength. I've been working on the back exercises ever since, and, touch wood, there haven't been any side-effects.

"But I remember well the first full training session I had last year. It was the May bank holiday. That was most of the winter and the spring I had missed. But I've never had as good a run as I've had this year. I haven't missed one training session with Dublin all year. And I'm feeling as fit as I ever have."

When Moran thinks of tomorrow's meeting with Laois, he doesn't need any reminder of what lies in store. Clearly this is the game Dublin have been thinking about for the last few months.

"We knew after the Louth game that the real test had still to come. We didn't learn much at all that day, and I suppose there are still a lot of questions to be answered about this Dublin team.

"And everyone knows the self-belief that Mick O'Dwyer has given this Laois team, especially with the confidence they're showing now. They're also showing great fitness, playing fast, fast football. And they've got the discipline sorted as well, something they might have been lacking over the last few years.

"And I think Laois have always had good footballers, but they've never got themselves together at the same time. Mick O'Dwyer has brought that sense of unity. And beating Offaly was a huge win for them too. Offaly mightn't show a lot in the league, but come the championship they are always tough. We played them two years ago and it was as hard a game as we've ever had."

A game like this, Dublin's first big test of the year, touches every nerve of every player. But nerves can be easily settled with confidence, and that too flows through every Dublin player. There is certainly no hiding Moran's confidence as a defender. Those days of high scoring might be over, but the days when he truly shines might only be just beginning.

"It doesn't really concern me where I play. If I can stay fit and keep playing good football and Dublin are winning and I can hold on to the jersey, then that's all you really want."