Chris Barrett is the Mayo U-21 team captain
FEATURE
Mike Finnerty
HAVE you ever wondered what it must be like to play senior football for Mayo? To pull on the famous green and red jersey. To realise your lifelong dream.
Chris Barrett used to wonder too. He had played in an All-Ireland minor final, won an All-Ireland U-21 medal, and the next step seemed a foregone conclusion.
Ironically, a broken leg sustained in a car crash on his way to Mayo training in August of 2006 delayed the inevitable. But it was always going to happen. Just a question of when and where.
The record books will show that his moment arrived in February at Celtic Park in Derry. It was a cold, wet, windy, miserable Saturday night. Mayo lost. And that left Chris Barrett disappointed and annoyed. But later, when he thought about it, he knew it was a night he would never forget.
“It was a huge honour for me running out the night,” he recalled last week. “It was great for Belmullet as well with Billy [Padden] and Shane [Nallen] being involved too, lads that I’ve grown up with and always played football with. Plus, there are so many guys in the Mayo dressing-room now that I’ve played minor and U-21 with as well, it makes everything easier.”
Most of the time, Chris Barrett is far too busy to be pondering about ifs, buts and maybes. He will be 21 next week, is leaving NUI, Galway next month, and has a job lined up as a Civil Engineer. Throw in the fact that Belmullet have big plans this year, on top of his U-21 and senior commitments with Mayo, and you can see why he is looking mostly to the future.
“I’d love to lift the Connacht U-21 title,” he admits. “Football is the biggest thing in my life at the moment and it’s a dream come true to captain Mayo. I talk a fair bit on the field but I suppose I’m the kind of person who tries to lead by example.
“One of the best things about this Mayo team is the fact that so many of us have played together since U-16 and minor. I mean it seems like Tom Cunniffe has always been inside me, on my left-hand side, and Ger Cafferkey behind me at full-back.”
Barrett is part of Mayo football’s latest ‘golden generation’. If he wasn’t playing in the Sigerson Cup with NUI, Galway this Spring he was travelling the highroads and byroads with the Mayo senior squad.
And then the Connacht U-21 championship rolled around. He has won the competition twice already so you wonder if he found it hard to get motivated for the recent semi-final against Leitrim. A small crowd, a bad day. Well?
I didn’t to be honest,“ he answers swiftly. “It’s the U-21 championship, you’re playing for your county, you’re the captain of the team. That’s a big honour and something I take great pride in.
We hadn’t a lot of time together before the Leitrim game and I think that showed on the day. We were probably a bit rusty and it took us a while to get on top. But I think once we get a few training sessions under our belts we’ll improve.
“It’s been difficult for the management. The first game we had together was against Dublin about two weeks before the Leitrim game so it wasn’t easy for them or us. But the win was the important thing.”
That sense of perspective is something that has always marked Chris Barrett out from the crowd.
Ever since he made that first journey from his home in Carramore, outside Belmullet, to his first county trial. And his feet are remaining firmly on the ground.
“It’s going to be very difficult to beat Roscommon. They’ll be psyched up, especially since we’re going for three-in-a-row. We’ve had a couple of battles with them over the last few years and I presume this won’t be any different.”
