Bernard Brogan joined Off The Ball along with his brother Alan as the pair looked back on their Dublin careers.
The pair both played under manager Pat Gilroy who used some unorthodox psychological tactics to get the best from the Dublin team.
'One of my terms was that when the Dublin bus was driving to Croke Park it wouldn't pass the ad with me on it' | #GAA
Bernard Brogan considered the balance to be struck between commercialism and the team's well-being | ⬇️⬇️⬇️
Full Video ➡️ https://t.co/XaHqUTvAA0 pic.twitter.com/S3clOJGqQP— Off The Ball (@offtheball) September 16, 2020
"It wasn't just me he was asking hard questions of," recalled Bernard Brogan of Gilroy.
"He understood psychology well, he went away and did a course on psychology in 2009 about understanding mindsets.
"He put a lot of pressure on Alan for a lot of things, Barry Cahill, a lot of the senior players got asked a lot of hard questions by Pat, not just me.
"Mine was probably the heaviest set, but he sensed I got energy from it. I loved it when he called me out."
Brogan: energised by pressure
The 'heavy' treatment Brogan received was for everyone's benefit though, he even got prior warning on one occasion.
"Pat was a great leader, at one stage in one of those meetings where he called me out he actually rang me before it," revealed Brogan junior.
"He said 'Bernard, just to give you a heads up, I'm going to cut you in half in this meeting, I fell the group needs it. Whatever you did at the weekend I'm going to use that.'
"I was like 'god, this is great, I'm in the inner circle here.' So his leadership was that I was empowered, he went into the group, he cut me in half. The rest of the team ore like 'oh we better be selfless!'
"While I'm there taking the battering ram. That was the sense of how his leadership was, he understood how to use the energy in the group."
Bernard Brogan relayed an interesting condition of those 'King of the Hill' ads | ⬇️⬇️⬇️
— Off The Ball (@offtheball) September 16, 2020
A better footballer
Gilroy was relatively new in the role but had high expectations of the players, Brogan especially, who wasn't an automatic starter at the time.
The forward had confidence in his game and getting in the fifteen regularly.
"I believed I could change that, I was playing well, I was getting scores," said Brogan of his play at the time.
"That was my argument back at him. I was getting five or six points from play here, what's the problem, is that not enough?
"He was like 'no, it's not enough. We want to get over the line here. We need to work hard as a team to win the big games.'
"He pushed me hard for that. I felt I had enough quality, I just had to work on some things.
"It was that kind of energetic motivation, that I was going to get after, that I was going to be fitter and be better."
The penny dropped for Brogan, and Gilroy was proven right in the end.
"When I did actually work harder for the team, I ended up getting more chances," realised the seven-time All Ireland winner.
"The ball was coming back to me much more. I'd pop it on to someone and go on a loop, make another run and end up with the ball back and tip it over the bar.
"It actually made me become a better footballer."
Brogan was speaking ahead of the launch of his new book, The Hill, written in collaboration with Kieran Shannon.
The Hill promises to be a fascinating account of an exceptional sportsman’s uphill journey to again play the sport that he loves and meaningfully contribute to probably the most outstanding feat in Irish team sport history: the Five in a Row.
Bernard Brogan: The Hill – My Autobiography
Publication date: September 7, 2020
