Galway is still Joyce Country with three more years ahead of their loyal servant
Declan Bogue
ANOTHER THREE YEARS for Pádraic Joyce in charge of the Galway footballers. It has all the feeling of his choice, and his alone.
To understand the esteem that Joyce is held in around Galway, we refer to Ciarán Murphy’s book ‘This Is The Life’ about his formative years growing up and playing with Milltown.
“Joyce was a force of nature,” he writes.
“It’s a badge of honour to say that you won’t ever be intimidated on a football field, but there’s no doubt Joyce intimidated club players. Her intimidated me, for sure.”
Murphy went on to recount the time Joyce captained the Ireland International Rules team to victory, but still showed up in the wilds of north Connemara to play Carna in a league game the following morning.
It was his manner in another way that really was arresting.
“Even when he wasn’t playing, he exerted a gravitational pull among club players of his generation. There have always been at least seven or eight senior club teams in Galway within fifteen miles of Tuam, sometimes more, so it would stand to reason that there would often be four or five senior championship games played in Tuam Stadium every championship weekend.”
Players from nearby clubs would filter in to watch a double-header if they weren’t involved that day, or else catch the first half of a day they were. There could be dozens of young men standing on the bank, and they were pulled to one figure.
‘And the giant figure at the centre of that broad circle was, of course, Joyce. He loved football so much and lived for it so completely, that he was barely ever a dispassionate viewer. And if players made mistakes, he could be devastatingly cutting. I never thought he rated me much as a player, but at least I knew that I was far from alone.’
Somehow, Joyce is still the chieftain in Galway football, having agreed to do another three years as senior manager. Galway is Joyce Country. The current arrangement would expire at the end of the 2028 season, by which time, he would be Galway’s longest-serving manager.
Which would come as little surprise, given he started playing football for Galway as a minor in 1993, and finished his senior career with an unedifying qualifiers loss to Antrim in 2012, making him one of Galway’s longest-serving players also.
There’s something of his close friend Kieran McGeeney. The two mirror each other in that they lead by example and they never lose faith.
Setting the arrangement at three years fulfils a couple of functions. For a start, managers are wary of one-year terms. The famous example is when Alex Ferguson signed a one-year contract in January 2004 and subsequently watched his Manchester United players adopt a work to rule policy, taking their foot off the gas believing that a new man was being groomed.
A 12-month extension would have aimed a gun at Joyce’s head; Sam Maguire or you’re gone. Three years hints at a project, possibly a rebuild or, at the least, a slight reshaping of the team.
With John Divilly stepping out, he has room to bring in another selector. Having added Mickey Graham to the set-up last year, he is in no rush to do this. And from what certain photos show us, he seems well got with his players.
There are more pressing matters to consider. In 2025, he wrestled with the idea of who would be his goalkeeper. Conor Gleeson has been replaced by Conor Flaherty within games. Gleeson himself has warmed up in games to replace Flaherty. It’s a difficult position but Galway need to nail it down in 2026.
In winning the Connacht championship, they looked in a good place. In their All-Ireland group stages game they were seriously entertaining but ultimately they could not stop Tom Lahiff clipping over a late hooter-beater point in Salthill.
They then drew with Derry in Celtic Park, again falling foul to the last point of the game with Conor Doherty levelling matters for Derry, before they edged already-qualified Armagh by a point in Breffni Park.
Down got to within two points of them in Newry, before their season was sunk by Meath in Croke Park in the All-Ireland quarter-final.
The games they were involved in were bizarre and fun. But would they have beaten a Donegal or Kerry? Not in that form.
In many respects, Galway are not far off. They have the spine of an All-Ireland winning team. They need to convince that the juice will be worth the squeeze, and just how much juice they can squeeze out of Paul Conroy who turns 37 next May.
The really tricky part is to decide who to mould into the latest edition of the Terrible Twins. Going back to Stockwell and Purcell, Galway always had an identifiable strike duo among the forwards. Joyce was one of them, along with Ja Fallon.
The days of Shane Walsh and Damien Comer playing together however, seem gone, dashed by how injury-prone they are.
Back in May 2024, there was an alarming stat that Comer and Walsh had completed just two full games together since the 2022 All-Ireland final. After that game, Comer was the All-Star full-forward while Walsh was shortlisted for the Footballer of the Year.
Across 2024 and 2025, they have only started four games together.
It would be crazy to say that either would be dropped, though they have a lot of football played with Walsh turning 33 next summer and Comer 32 in January.
What they can give, they will give. It would seem sensible in the meantime to mould Rob Finnerty and the excellent and emerging Matthew Thompson together.
When Joyce first took the job over from Kevin Walsh in late November 2019, he granted an interview to Galway Bay FM.
“Our aim is to win another All-Ireland – simple as that. Anything less will be seen as an underachievement,” he said.
Nothing changes. Even if it takes nine years.
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