Michael Meehan (Gaelic footballer)

Michael Meehan is a Gaelic footballer from County Galway. Meehan plays his club football with Caltra and played county football for the Galway senior football team.^[1] He announced his retirement from inter county football on 21 March 2014 due to injury.

Michael Meehan

Personal information
Irish name	Mícheál Ó Míocháin
Sport	Gaelic football
Position	Full Forward
Born	(1984-05-10) 10 May 1984 (age 40) Ballinasloe, Ireland
Occupation	Teacher
Club(s)
Years	Club
2001–	Caltra
Club titles
Galway titles	1
Connacht titles	1
All-Ireland Titles	1
Colleges(s)
Years	College
	NUI Galway
College titles
Sigerson titles	1
Inter-county(ies)
Years	County	Apps (scores)
2003–2014, 2017	Galway	31 (12-84) SFC only
Inter-county titles
Connacht titles	3
All-Irelands	0
NFL	0
All Stars	0

Career

College

Meehan attended St Jarlath's College in Tuam, playing in three consecutive Hogan Cups in 2000, 2001, and 2002. Although they lost the 2000 semi-final to St. Patrick's Navan and the 2001 final to the same opponents they were unstoppable in 2002 to claim their 12th title with a 3–13 to 0–06 victory against St. Michael's Enniskillen. He was an inspirational figure at full-forward, scoring 1–06. Future Galway teammates, Darren Mullahy, Gary Sice, Damien Dunleavy, Alan Burke and Niall Coleman were also on the team. James Kavanagh, a future Kildare senior, also played on the side. Michael captained the team in their victorious 2002 campaign.

He inspired NUI Galway to the 2003 Sigerson Cup, the first time the university had won that trophy since 1992.^[2][3][4]

Inter-county

Meehan won a Connacht MFC medal in 2002, and made his first inter-county Championship start in 2003, the Connacht Senior Football Championship 1st round clash against Roscommon. Since then, he has been a key part of the Galway set-up, having been consistently been picked by four different managers, John O'Mahony, Peter Forde, Liam Sammon and Joe Kernan. Michael has 3 Connacht medals to his name, coming in 2003, 2005 and 2008.^{[citation needed]}

In 2004, Meehan was part of the Caltra team that enjoyed a memorable run to All-Ireland Club Championship glory. After coming through the Galway and Connacht club finals, which first time triumphs for the club, Caltra met An Ghaeltacht of Munster. In a close exciting encounter, Caltra prevailed by one point, 0–13 to 0–12. Michael was named Man Of The Match for his performance, scoring 6 points. His brothers, Declan, Tomás, Enda and Noel, who captained the team, were all starting players on the team.^[5]

For several years, Meehan was also a part of the Galway Under-21 set up. He was a key part of both of Galway's Under-21 All-Ireland triumphs in 2002 and 2005. He formed a devastating partnership with Seán Armstrong in 2005 as they scored 6–03 between them in Galways' 6-05 to 4–06 victory over Down.^{[citation needed]}

In the 2008 Championship, Meehan won his third Connacht senior medal on 13 July as Galway defeated Mayo by 2–12 to 1–14 in MacHale Park. In their quarter-final clash against Kerry, Michael scored 10 points and seemed to be carrying the Galway side in the first half against the reigning All-Ireland champions. However, despite leading by 2 points early in the second-half, they could not capitalise on their advantage and Kerry won out in the end by 5 points. Michael finished the 2008 season with 0–22, one point short of his personal best.^{[citation needed]}

Meehan was due to captain the Galway Senior Footballers for the 2010 Championship but sat out due to injury.^{[citation needed]} 2011 proved to be difficult as Meehan continued to battled a troubled ankle injury that almost derailed his career.^{[citation needed]} In 2012 he made a dramatic recovery, but did not return until the Connacht quarter Final as a sub against Roscommon.^{[citation needed]} On 21 March 2014 he announced his retirement from inter-county football due to ongoing injury trouble.^{[citation needed]}

Personal life

Michael is the youngest of the Meehan brothers. Both Declan and Tomás have won All-Ireland medals for Galway, in 1998 and 2001. The passion of football in the Meehan family was clearly evident when 5 brothers started on the successful All-Ireland Club Championship Caltra side while eldest brother Seamus was a sub on that day. Michael's sister, Mairead, was a sporting star in her own right. She was a very useful camogie player. A teacher who graduated from DCU, she gained an All-Ireland junior camogie medal with Holy Rosary College. Mairead died in 2007 from osteosarcoma.^[6]

Meehan has participated in a marketing campaign for Ireland West Airport.^[7]

He teaches mathematics at St Jarlath's College, where he was educated, and helps manage the school team.^[8][9]

References

1. Michael Meehan named as Galway captain
2. "Meehan too hot for UCD". Sunday Independent. 9 March 2003. Inspired by Galway football's rising star Michael Meehan, NUI Galway won their first ... Sigerson Cup championship since 1992 when they edged out UCD in yesterday's final at Páirc Uí Rinn... NUIG drew level five minutes later when Galway prodigy Michael Meehan landed a well executed free from wide on the right.... followed by a wonderful equaliser from lively NUIG corner-forward Colm McFadden... Colm McFadden struck a sweet point after just 15 seconds and Brendan Colleran reduced the deficit to the minimum a minute later.
3. Foley, Alan (25 August 2012). "Forward motion". Irish Examiner. Archived from the original on 17 November 2018. Later that year, he began his studies in Financial Maths and Economics at NUI Galway, winning the All-Ireland Freshers alongside players like Matthew Clancy from Galway, Clare's Mikey O'Dwyer and Mark O'Connell, John Donoghue of Meath and David O'Shaughnessy, a native of Westmeath... "Winning the Sigerson in Cork wasn't something that might've been expected of us at all," McFadden says. "We had Lorcan and Brendan Colleran, Mattie Clancy again and Michael Meehan, who was unreal. Dessie Dolan pulled his hamstring in the quarter-final and missed out but we took in a lad from Mayo, Michéal Keane, who played as a sweeper and was brilliant. They were a good group."
4. "What a year it was!". Hogan Stand. 20 November 2003. "We [Dundalk] then went to NUI Galway [formerly UCG] and put in another great performance against a team that included Matthew Clancy, Michael Meehan and Brendan Colleran of Galway. They also had Dessie Dolan from Westmeath but Dessie missed most of the campaign through injury. When NUI Galway went on to actually win the Sigerson cup out, it put our performance into context.
5. "Breaking Sligo News from The Sligo Champion - Independent.ie".
6. The late Mairead Meehan
7. "Donegal GAA stars join forces as Ambassadors for Ireland West Airport Knock". Donegal Democrat. Johnston Press. 13 May 2013. Retrieved 13 May 2013.
8. "Some of the New Staff Members in SJC". 17 November 2011. Archived from the original on 8 February 2019.
9. Donoghue, Eamon (23 January 2015). "Schools GAA: Michael Meehan sparking St Jarlath's revival as tradition dies hard". The Irish Times. Today Meehan is back where it all began, teaching, managing and helping St Jarlath's adapt to a very different Hogan Cup landscape, made all the harder for them since 2006 when they ended the option for pupils to board in the school... In his third year teaching maths in the school, Meehan is also managing the school's junior footballers, having moved up from managing the first years for the previous two years.