GAA: GAVIN CUMMISKEYtalks to corner back Aindriú Mac Lochlainn abut football, family commitments, and the thin line that separates winners and losers

AINDRIÚ MAC Lochlainn. Fada on the ú. Got it? The Kildare corner back was once Andrew McLoughlin but decided to make the switch to his native tongue official. This doesn’t seem like a GAA story until he brings in one of the most famous Galway football clans.

“My brother started off going to Coláiste Chiaráin in Connemara. Seán Óg de Paor’s family are involved down there. My brother was second eldest and then all in order we started going down there.

“I used to be practising the Gaeilge down there a lot more and with Seán Óg being such an amazing player it was easy to get into. Obviously he speaks fluently and he was a big influence. It’s something I always loved.

“My Da worked very hard and he wouldn’t have much Irish from school. My Mam was in school a bit longer and would have a bit more Irish, but apart from that the rest of us went to the Gaeltacht.”

It quickly becomes apparent the 27-year-old has two conflicting priorities in life: The Lilywhites and his family – wife Sharon and two young daughters Hannah-Rose (16 months) and Ella-May (3). After last year’s devastating All-Ireland semi-final defeat to Down, there was the heartwarming sight of Mac Lochlainn playing with Ella-May on the sacred turf of Croke Park.

“They’ll be going to the Gaelscoil soon. I speak Irish to them – nothing major, just the normal day to day stuff and hopefully they pick it up.”

The conflict is a common one for any bread-winner, he is a cabinet maker who seeks to play an amateur sport that requires professional levels of endeavour.

“Yeah, it’s a huge commitment for my family. My parents and my wife’s parents have to help out a great deal. My wife works in a salon in Kildare, she’s a beauty therapist (Cloud 9 in Kildare, for those wondering) and they open until 8pm. I go training a lot earlier than that so there’s a lot of people picking up my slack. It’s very hard. I wouldn’t be able to do it unless I had the support of my family.

“I don’t know how long they can keep it going for. It’s a big sacrifice for them to make. I get to tog off in Croke Park but they’re the ones that make all the sacrifices and don’t get anything in return, bar seeing the love that I have for it.”

With Kieran McGeeney as a manager, little else will be tolerated but this particular intercounty footballer embraces the Spartan existence.

“It was probably a full-time job for Kieran McGeeney five years ago but maybe he was ahead of the game.

“If you’re going to be successful at anything you have to be dedicated to it. If you’re not you’re not going to get anything back out of it. It’s as simple as that. If it was easy everyone would be doing it. It is like a full-time job but then again, you see American kids, they train so hard with their school teams. If you’re to meet with them and tell them your training schedule they’d laugh at you.

“I know people in America and their kids and they get up before they go to school to train with their teams and they start school earlier than us. It’s like professional for them.

“Different cultures might see what we do as semi-professional but for us, compared to what we have here, it’s a huge amount of dedication and it’s hard to fit the rest of your life around it.”

So, Mac Lochlainn needs to win something now, at his peak, before family life takes over. To do so in Leinster football, inevitably, Dublin must be conquered.

“Dublin are a very fit and fast team, so unless you match them physically with your pace and power, you’re going to be left behind,” he reasons.

In the 2003 and 2009 provincial finals Kildare came up short against Laois and then Dublin. “If you talk to any successful player who’s won Leinster titles or All-Ireland titles, they only remember the ones they lost. Unfortunately, I’m not in a position to talk about the ones I’ve won yet.

“Hopefully before I finish up I’ll have some silverware, but most people only remember the ones they lost. They can concentrate on the things that went wrong. It’s fractions, it’s tiny little things that may have gone wrong, a little bit of luck here and there for a ball to bounce the right way for you, to save a goal or get a goal.”

The man who will probably be shadowing a Brogan come Sunday may have a significant say in all of this at Croke Park.