LAST UPDATE | 21 Aug 2021

GIVEN SLIGO ROVERS’ poor run of results, you might think David Cawley has had little to cheer of late, but in one respect, you’d be wrong.

Hailing from Ballina in County Mayo, the midfielder has had a passion for GAA since childhood, and so he was watching closely last weekend, as his county pulled off a stunning All-Ireland semi-final win over Dublin.

“I was waiting for this question,” he smiles. “It was brilliant, they were excellent in all fairness. They weren’t in the first half, but being a Mayo fan obviously all my life, they do like to give you a heart attack along the way. After half-time, I was thinking they will definitely come out a different animal, but I didn’t expect them to pull it back the way they did. Fair play to them.”

Had fate taken a different turn, Cawley might even have been lining out in Croke Park last Saturday.

“I was both [GAA and soccer] the whole way up. I went over to Ipswich during transition year in school, but funnily enough, our 16s got to the county final and I had to report at Ipswich for pre-season. So I was over there for six weeks and in fairness to them, they sent me back for the county final. I went back, played for Ballina, we won it. We had a bit of craic and I went back to Ipswich again to continue with the pre-season.

“But my family was football driven, they loved it, the whole group were Man United fans, mum and dad same, I have an older brother who played, my sister actually played in her younger days as well, so it was a constant topic in the house really and still is.”

For a while, this season, Cawley’s Sligo side looked capable of pulling off a Mayo-esque upset. Not fancied by many critics as title contenders at the start of the campaign, until recently, they were neck and neck with both Shamrock Rovers and St Pat’s for the top spot.

As recently as last month, a 1-0 win over Longford saw them go level on points with the Hoops. Since then though, they have been in freefall, losing six games on the bounce, with the hugely disappointing Europa Conference League exit at the hands of Icelandic side FH starting off this downturn in form.

Sligo have suffered a bad run of results since getting knocked out of Europe. Tommy Dickson / INPHO Tommy Dickson / INPHO / INPHO

As a result, a title push now looks unlikely, though a European spot remains very much in their hands. Liam Buckley’s side currently sit third, 12 points behind leaders Shamrock Rovers, albeit with a game in hand today, where they will be looking to arrest the recent decline, as they host Derry City.

“We have to be honest with ourselves now and we have been this week,” says Cawley. “We’re in a bit of a sticky patch. We’re losing games, but at the same time, we’re only losing by a goal. It’s not like we’re getting battered around the place. We need to just look at ourselves in the mirror, go back to basics, look at the things that got us to the top of the table. The starts in the run-up to games, the hard work, training-wise, intensity, the whole lot, we just need to look at it all again, reset, regroup as a team. This is a stage now where everyone is looking at us. We need to stick together. It will turn because we have the players and the squad depth there.

“I’ve been at this club a long time. I know this is one of the biggest clubs in the country, I’ve won leagues and cups here, so that’s my aim always, to get back up there and we’re gradually getting there. We’re in the top three at the moment, we’ve games in hand on second place [St Pat's]. So it’s in our hands to get back on track to what we’re aiming for. We want to stay there, get as close to the top two as we can and whatever will be after that will be.”

The need to be resilient in the face of adversity is nothing new for Cawley. As well as GAA, he played soccer with Ballina Town as a youngster and also travelled up to Dublin to represent Shelbourne when the Mayo leagues had finished for the season. After impressing in the Kennedy Cup, he earned a transfer to Ipswich and moved over to England at the age of 16, spending four seasons there in total.

“The U16 lads in England were still in school, so I’d be full-time with the U18s or reserves, you’d get called across or you’d train with the first team. I was mixing with lads who were older than me, which was great. And the second year then, I started my first year scholarship. So you’re in with the youth team then, you’re with the U18s for two years. My final year then was a professional term, but during that time, I was playing youth team and reserves, so you’re playing two games a week along with training full time. It was a hectic schedule, but it opened your eyes to what it really was, what it was really about.”

Fellow Mayo native Ronan Murray was at Ipswich with Cawley. Laszlo Geczo / INPHO Laszlo Geczo / INPHO / INPHO

As with most players who travel to England at a young age, filling the endless hours away from the football pitch proved a challenge for Cawley.

“It’s not a bad thing, but some days, you’re finished by one or two. You’re just in digs for the day, you’re too young to drive. You’re living outside the town, catching buses just to get to the cinema or do something else.

“Luckily enough, I had Ronan Murray with me, another lad from Mayo, he’s obviously with Drogheda right now. He’s had a very good career. We were the same age, going into the Mayo team for the Kennedy Cup and all that, so we were bored off our heads but at least we were together.

“People your age are graduating from school. You’re across the water training, missing out on little bits and pieces. You think they really mattered at the time and they did probably affect me as well, but looking back now, I wouldn’t change it.

“I wish I trained harder. I like to think I am a hard trainer, but there’s always more you can do just to get yourself that chance in and around the first team, but other than that, I think the experience stood to me.”

Man United and Ireland legend Roy Keane was one of three managers at the helm during Cawley’s four years with the Tractor Boys.

“He was very demanding, which is exactly what we expected with his playing career anyway. He didn’t take many sessions but he’d be always watching whether you were with the reserves, the first team or the youth team. He was at a lot of the games

“Whether you were my age, 17, or one of the senior players, even the players he bought, the demands were the same. So you could tell what his level was [and why he was] a player at Man United and stuff like that.”

Cawley ultimately never got a chance to test himself at first-team level in the Championship, with injuries hampering his progression.

“I’d like to have played a couple of games to see what the level was like. Obviously, I’m imagining here, because I didn’t play for the first team, that the level is highly demanding. I would have loved the opportunity. I’d suffered a couple of injuries and I don’t want to be one of them fellas that come back from England and say ‘aw, my injuries’ or whatever, But I think I suffered at the worst time in the season. The first time I did it, I was U18s and a couple of the lads were getting a sniff towards the end of that English season. The season fizzled out for Ipswich, and [inexperienced] lads got a couple of games, whereas I was on crutches.

“The following year again, going towards March and April, the same injury, a knee injury put me on crutches, but my contract was running out two months later, and you just knew it was game over from then.

“I had no choice but to come home. There was none of this going somewhere else for trials. I was injured from March 2011 until January 2012. Paul Cook invited me down for training with Sligo, so I had a few months missing there [in England], but I think it’s the timing and a small bit of luck.

“A lot of lads that I played with did get the chance. Some of them that had Championship appearances at Ipswich aren’t even playing now, so it’s fine lines really.”

Roy Keane's stint as Ipswich boss coincided with Cawley's time there. Stephen Pond Stephen Pond

Since then, Cawley has carved out a good career at League of Ireland level. Aside from a season apiece at St Pat’s and Galway in 2016 and 2017 respectively, he has spent the entirety of that time with Sligo.

When The42 last caught up with Cawley in February 2020, just before the onset of the pandemic when the entire playing and coaching staff at Sligo had to be temporarily let go, he spoke of starting to prepare for life after football and getting a part-time job in retail. Has he maintained this role since then?

“I haven’t, no. I haven’t been back since the whole Covid situation. And to be fair to us, there’s no time at Sligo now. Maybe off-season. I haven’t spoken to the manager that I used to work for. But our off-season is so long anyway, it was great to try something else.

“I had never done anything like that, I’ve been playing since I was 16 going to England, but it was an eye-opener, and it’s something I think players as they get older in the league, you can’t play football for your whole life and you think they should try something outside of sport and give you a feel of what it’s like. 

“But I really enjoyed it, mixing with different people. I didn’t know any of the people even though it was in town here in Ballina. So I was starting from scratch, getting to know people, learning new things. The Christmas period is obviously mental busy, I didn’t know what was going on, I needed all the help I could get. The people I was working with were brilliant in fairness to them.”

For now, though, the 29-year-old’s attention remains firmly on playing.

“Obviously, a lot of clubs are part-time. So they’re probably juggling both sides in-season. We’ve always been full-time at Sligo, the only time we get is the off-season so the full focus is football throughout January to the end of October or November. We’re hands-on until then.”

And despite recent setbacks, Cawley insists he is confident his team will come good and build on their initial progress.

“We definitely have a bigger squad than the 2012 team we won the league with. And I mentioned that to the lads already. That’s how positive I am with this group because they’ve shown it early on in the season. I’d say it’s probably the best squad of players we’ve had since the 2012-13 season. That’s why I’m confident we can pull together and get back on track.”

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