Ryan's profit from the margins

GAELIC GAMES:Despite coming from an unheralded football background Jason Ryan continues to confound expectations in Wexford, writes KEITH DUGGAN

HE WAS not Wexford’s first choice and certainly not the most obvious. He did not have the decorated playing career or the benefit of coming from one of the elite counties of Gaelic games or one of the big families. He came with no advance notice and with less fanfare and muted expectation but from the beginning, Jason Ryan has confounded expectations.

This year it is no different. Before Ryan was plucked from obscurity in the winter of 2007, Wexford had not been to a Leinster final since 1956. Now they play Dublin in the provincial showpiece for the second time in four years. It is a remarkable turnaround and Ryan’s record gives voice to those places that have always been on the margins of Gaelic football: his formative years were spent kicking ball in London and Waterford.

His knowledge and opinions on the game were formed through observation and self-belief and through his own convictions. Wexford took a risk with Ryan. His record was promising but slender: just one county title as a trainer with Wexford club Clongeen. It wasn’t so much the fact of the victory that counted as the word about Ryan’s sparkling contribution.

“I always remember one particular thing about Jason,” says Bob Treacy of Clongeen, who Ryan trained to their first and only county title in 2007.

“We had just won the county semi-final and it was an incredibly exciting thing for us. But Jason couldn’t be out of the dressingroom quick enough and he headed back up to the stand with a notebook to watch the second semi-final. And that was the immediate thing that stood out about him. His attention to detail was second to none. He will never take anything for granted and is never happy unless he has every detail right.”

Treacy isn’t even fully sure how they came across Ryan. Ger Foxe, a selector with the club (and now a selector with Ryan) had heard of him through contacts. They knew he had been in London, that he taught PE, and that he kicked football with Waterford. Someone just suggested they talk. They invited Ryan to watch them play a match against Fethard and afterwards, this friendly, intense young man told them he felt they had a team he could work with but he was getting married in a fortnight and wouldn’t be available for a while. They decided to go with it.

“The funny thing is we just scraped into the quarter-final. We made it there on points difference. Then Jason came in and had this big impact and the rest is history. People just responded to him.”

As it happened, Wexford football was at a crossroads. Paul Bealin had just quit as manager. Some big names were sounded out – Seán Boylan among them. Then someone came up with the idea of speaking with Ryan. It was daunting: he was only 31 and his playing career was rooted in the blue-collar fortunes of football. In fact, his last match for Waterford proved to be against Kerry, during one of those slayings the Kingdom inflict on Waterford in Munster. Ryan was the fifth substitute used by Waterford that day in Fraher Field.

This was his fate as a player: good enough to breathe the same air and challenge for the same ball as the fabled names in green and gold but essentially existing in a different world. Ryan was serious about his football, always. When he lived in London, he played with Tara and quickly became the voice of conscience in the dressingroom.

“Always very organised, always the first there, always thinking about tactics for the game ahead,” says Seán Faulkner, now chairman of the Tara club who still speaks regularly with Ryan. “The signs were always there.”

And when Ryan got the out-of-the-blue invitation to manage Wexford, his immediate regret was he would have to finish up his playing career. So his playing life was rooted in the margins; Sunday afternoons in Ruislip and a few seasons in the underworld of Division Four with Waterford. Not long after he was given the Wexford job, he made a point that is often forgotten. “The reality is that with a team like Waterford you put in the same efforts as any other county, the same number of hours training and not always getting the same reward out of it.”

What made him special is he was able to apply those experiences to his own views on how a team should be organised and have the conviction to take on the best in the game.

“We lost two Leinster semi-finals and couldn’t make the breakthrough,” says Pat Roe, who managed Wexford from 2003 to 2005. “I felt there was a fantastic bunch of players there who gave a full commitment. Jason came along and he has brought it to another level, particularly in terms of self-belief. The breakthrough was probably getting to that Leinster final in his first year. They suffered a heavy defeat to Dublin but they were able to recover and put in a good performance against Tyrone in the All-Ireland semi-final.

“What Jason has done has changed the profile of Wexford football. He has them wanting to play football. He has shown enthusiasm and his self-belief and attention to detail have inspired those players. I have met Jason several times and we spoke a fair bit on the phone during his first year. He is a highly intelligent young man and highly motivated. He really has done wonders for the game in Wexford.”

The first season has still has the glitter of fairy dust about it: a ten-point comeback against Meath to win a Leinster quarter-final, the imperious Mattie Forde landing the winner. Then the novelty of a full house Croke Park final against Dublin dissolving into a grim lesson in life against the big boys and that shocking final score: 3-23 to 0-9.

They might have retreated then, dazzled by where they found themselves. But the harshness of that game did not diminish the faith which the players had placed in Ryan: Forde was singing his praises in the opening stages of the league. “People are saying he is only 31 or whatever. But he knows his football.”

And crucially, Ryan stayed calm through that terrible afternoon, patiently explaining afterwards why it had fallen apart. Wexford’s recovery was instant, defeating Armagh in the All-Ireland quarter-final and going on to perform decently against a Tyrone team that had obliterated Dublin.

“You have to understand that Jason is a guy who is always on his toes, always enthusiastic,” Bob Treacy says.

“The attitude in the county that year was that it was great just to be in a Leinster final. Like, I had never seen Wexford playing at that level in my entire life. It was a bit of an annihilation against Dublin but he has the ability to get his players to respond to setbacks.”

And there have been setbacks. It is easily forgotten Wexford waited until July for their first win of 2009, a qualifier against Offaly. In the league, Ryan felt compelled to publicly apologise for a Wexford defeat against Kildare which finished 2-16 to 0-9. There have been bruising lessons.

Last year’s championship match against Dublin might have been the toughest of all: Wexford were seven points up with 20 minutes to go. Wexford hesitated and were caught in extra-time.

“We didn’t think it was shock,” Ryan insisted about the lead his team had opened up. “What surprised me was that we did not win the game in normal time.”

In the end, they were knocked out of the qualifiers against Cork: it was a summer of what could have been. This year, the retirement of Forde might have signalled a reversal of fortune for Wexford. Forde was so gifted his departure provided the team with a subconscious excuse if things did not go well.

“Technically, Mattie Forde is the best player I have ever seen,” Pat Roe says. “Because of that, there was always a feeling that when Wexford got possession, the ball should go to Mattie. Now, he is no longer there and they have made it work in their favour. The others have stepped up.

“Ciarán Lyng is a superb footballer, Redmond Barry is one of the best I have coached and younger players like Ben Brosnan have stepped up. I think it is significant John Hegarty is in the backroom too – he played with me in Wexford and is very knowledgeable about the game and is someone the players look up to. They have a lot of factors going in their favour.”

Wexford’s gung-ho attacking game – 7-52 scored in their three championship games – almost seems like a direct response to Forde’s absence, as if they needed to prove to themselves they could still thrive without his gifts. It brings Wexford back to the point they reached during the starburst that marked Ryan’s first year in charge.

But this year’s progress has been underpinned by a more businesslike approach rather than the euphoria which followed that win over Meath three seasons ago. Once again, Wexford are the novel team and Dublin the heavy favourites. There is the sense Wexford and Ryan will not permit the occasion to be a factor in the match.

Whatever the result of the match, it will not change the fact that the emergence of Jason Ryan is a victory for the marginalised places in the GAA as much as for the man himself. Seán Faulkner was as surprised as anyone when his former clubmate managed to leapfrog from league games in Ruislip to pitting his wits against Mickey Harte in Croke Park.

He knew Ryan’s temperament and approach would make him a candidate for management someday but he could never have guessed it would happen so fast. In the autumn of 2008, the Tara club held its 75th anniversary dinner in Cricklewood: Ryan returned as one of the guests. His former team-mates, most dotted around London, will be hoping for a Wexford win tomorrow.

“People here are delighted. He was very close to the club and it is great to see what he has done. Because he is a lovely fella. I know you have to be ruthless sometimes when you are a managing a county team but Jason goes about things the right way.”