Reigning champions Newbridge face Magherafelt in Derry championship decider

NOBODY ever thinks it could be them.

And then, in a split second, without warning, something goes ‘POP’ in the knee and that’s the season over.

Cruciate injuries are common enough but each one brings a unique wave of anguish and the road back onto the field is paved with pain and patience, rehab and doubt.

Mark McGrogan’s knee went the week before his club Newbridge were due to begin the defence of their Derry title.

Running up the wing with the ball, he went to turn and… Pain. He knew immediately serious damage was done and tests confirmed his worst fears that there’d be no championship football for him this year.

But there’s no ‘why me?’ from the Newbridge defender.

What would be the point?

The Sean O’Leary’s club is in his DNA and if he can’t play he’ll do all he can to support them. The former Derry minor and U20 star changed from a forward into a defender for his club, now he’s gone from go-to man-marker to Maor Uisce.

“I’ve never lifted as many cones or filled as many water bottles in my life,” says McGrogan who will have an operation to fix the damage in his knee next Thursday and hopes to return to action next summer.

“The club is all I know so if there’s anything I can do to help the team I’ll do it, that’s just the way it is. It has been difficult but when you’re in there among the boys it eases it a bit because it’s not about me, it’s about the team and winning whatever game it is.

“I’d rather be in the changing room or the dugout with the players and the management. It’s harder when I’m not in with the team and I’ve more time to dwell on it.

“You always think it’s something that happens to somebody else and it never crossed my mind it could be me until I did it, but it is what it is. I’m lucky the players and the management are unreal support. We’ve had plenty of injuries in the club and cruciate injuries happen to plenty of people so you just have to believe that everything happens for a reason and move on.”

At the last count there are eight McGrogans from four family strands in and around the squad and it would have been nine if Mark’s brother Peter hadn’t retired at the end of last season.

Padraig, Conor and Shane are brothers, then there are their cousins Conleith, Callum and Caolan, then Mark and then another cousin Michael. Their fathers all played in the 1989 team which was the last Newbridge side to be crowned kings of the heap in Derry until the class of 2024 ending Glen’s drive for a four in-a-row.

“They (the McGrogans of the 1980s) held that over us for a few years until we got our first one,” says Mark with a laugh.

The Derry championship tends to produce serial winners. There was a great Lavey team from 1990, then Bellaghy took over, Ballinderry held sway for several years, then Sleacht Neil became the team to beat, then Glen recorded a three in-a-row.

Now Newbridge are top dogs.

Manager Gary Hetherington and his merry men can complete the club’s first-ever three in-a-row if they can beat a Magherafelt team in it’s third final since they were 2019 champions on Sunday.

That’s a big ‘if’ because in Derry, like every other county, everybody wants to win.

“If you ask any player in any club it would be the same – winning the championship is what you dream of,” says McGrogan.

“The amount of time and effort and work you put into it and all the what-ifs and all the defeats that come along the way… It’s all worth it when you get over the line.

“And then to do it again last year… They don’t come around too often in Newbridge so nothing is ever taken for granted. Every victory you get in a Newbridge jersey means something to us and any chance you get to go and win something you want to grab it.

“We don’t look too far ahead, we don’t sit at the start of the year and say: ‘We’re gonna win this, we’re gonna win that’, we take pre-season as it comes and the league as it comes and then go game-by-game in the championship and just focus.”

He trots out the ‘take-each-game-as-it-comes’ and ‘look-no-further’ lines, apologising for the cliches and for repeating himself but he’s not trying to cover his homework here, it actually is how Newbridge go about their business.

There’s a humility about the team that prevents them from getting ahead of themselves and they’re determined not to dilute the hunger and self-belief that made them county champions in the first place when they took down a Glen side that had won the All-Ireland title just nine months previously.

“You have to believe you can do it,” says McGrogan of that first Derry title in 2024.

“There’s no point in doing all that work if you don’t believe you can go on and win it one day. Quality aside, we’re a humble group, we’re hard-working and we enjoy the grind that comes along with the campaign throughout the year.

“There’s no secret recipe to it, it’s just going out and wanting to get better, challenging the man beside you and trying to get the upperhand on anything you do. You can’t control what happens in a game but at least if you’ve done the work it’ll stand to something.”

It’s not all deadly serious in the Newbridge camp. Conor Doherty likes to keep the music pumping before and after games in the changing room and the players like to get out and play goal and socialise to take their minds off the football from time to time.

“You need a bit of a relief, anything at all to clear your head because it can get tough,” says McGrogan.

“So of us aren’t great golfers but we go out for a day’s craic more than anything and we’d be all fairly close.

“In terms of population we’re a small club but we’re close knit and what we lack in numbers I think we make up for it in our camaraderie and our spirit. It’s all you know playing alongside those boys so it comes naturally to us.

“We’re team-mates on the pitch and then away from it we’re friends as well. It’s not just all us McGrogans, there’s a genuine friendship between everybody there.”

IT wasn’t his idea to sacrifice his career as a forward to become a man-marker, it was Gary Hetherington’s. The Tyrone native’s keen eye spotted qualities in McGrogan that the player didn’t know he had.

It was quite a change for McGrogan who wore Derry’s number 15 jersey in the All-Ireland minor final in 2017 when a lad in Kerry’s green and gold stole the show. David Clifford announced himself to the world with 4-4 to rout the young Oak Leafers.

But they were special years for that talented Derry side and McGrogan finished with an Ulster minor title and two Ulster U21 medals to cherish.

“Playing in the All-Ireland final was very special although it obviously didn’t go the way we wanted it go that day,” he says.

He laughs when he’s asked about the ‘process’ that led to him concentrating on preventing scores instead of going looking for them.

“I wouldn’t say it was by choice,” he explains.

“No… Whenever Gary first spoke to me about it I think I laughed at him first clip but I quickly realised that whenever Gary’s facial expression hadn’t changed that he wasn’t joking.

“I consider myself a team player and if the management thinks I can do something that will contribute towards the one goal (winning) then I’m all on for it. I don’t know what he’d seen in me! Gary would have to answer that.

“Look, he knows what he’s going to get from me, he’ll get a bit of honesty and a bit of hard work and I suppose he just trusts that. I do enjoy it although when you mark good players, good players are going to do good things and you have to accept that, you’re not going to be fit to control everything.

“It’s a challenge and all you can do is go out and give it your best. I’m very fortunate to have players around me who are a massive support and I wouldn’t be fit to play that role without them because they cover me plenty of times.”

DESPITE being back-to-back champions, Newbridge were third favourites to win the Derry championship this year. Nothing has been won yet of course and a very capable and experienced Magherafelt side could yet prove the pundits right.

“Anybody can beat anybody else on the day in Derry,” says McGrogan.

“That’s why you can never look too far ahead. There’s plenty of respect between us and Magherafelt, they’re probably the most consistent team in the championship this year.

“They’re really well coached and they have a serious pool of talent there and they can hurt you from all over the pitch because they have serious pace. They play a good brand of football, they want to go out and win games so they fully deserves to be where they’re at.

“So there’s two good teams in the final and if they both get to the level they can play at it’ll be a good game and it’ll take a lot from us to match Magherafelt.

“We had a good performance in the semi-final against Glen but we didn’t play that well in the games before that so we can’t dwell on that performance too much.

“We’ve never mentioned anything about three in-a-row among ourselves. No way. We take each game as it comes and enjoy the challenge it brings.”

Three in-a-row champions?

Nobody ever thinks it could be them...