Conor McKenna wants to win finals at Essendon before he heads back home to Ireland
Conor McKenna has made no secret of his desire to return home to Ireland and win a Gaelic football title, but he still has a few years left in the AFL as he outlines his goals at Essendon.
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Essendon defender Conor McKenna wants to switch to the forward line as he revealed he wants the Bombers to win finals before he moves back to Ireland.
The Irish speedster was due to fly back to Australia as early as this weekend with the AFL hopeful of restarting the season next month.
The homesick star had spent an extra stint at his hometown in Dungannon, Northern Ireland, earlier this year, with fears he would never come back to Tullamarine.
He flew back again when the AFL was cancelled after Round 1.
But a refreshed McKenna now has a plan to help turn the Bombers into serious finals contenders and he wants to bring Gaelic football’s “dummy solo” into the AFL when he moves forward.
“The only thing is we haven’t really had a good run in finals yet which is something I’d really like to achieve,” McKenna, 24, said.
“I’ve played two finals and I’ve been beaten in both of them. That’s probably the goal to get a go in finals.”
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McKenna played most of his Gaelic football as a forward and started in that role at the Bombers.
But the supplements saga dashed that dream, with suspensions leaving a hole in the backline that the hard running Irishman was required to fill.
He has been in discussions with Bombers hierarchy and was due for a change up this year before coronavirus stopped the season after just one game.
“At some stage I want to go forward and I was trying to get it this year but then all of this happened,” he said.
“I would like to try a year probably as a forward, as much as you can as a forward before I’m done.”
Essendon coach John Worsfold said in March that McKenna was “more likely to be needed as a defender for us at the moment but that could change”.
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McKenna has become one of Essendon’s most important defenders. He finished fifth in the club’s 2019 best and fairest.
He stunned fans with his “dummy solo”, a common tactic in Gaelic football where players kick the ball to themselves to avoid an opponent, during a game against the Crows in July last year.
McKenna said that might be a weapon if he moves forward this year.
“I do it in training and stuff and tried just it a few times and it just came out, it was never something Australians really do so it was a big shock to them,” he said when speaking to the GAA Hour podcast in Ireland.
“I suppose it’s just getting the right time to do it because they usually go after you rather than the ball, because I play deep in defence. I think you would get away more with it in the forward line.”
McKenna’s family live in a picturesque small town less than an hour’s drive out of Belfast.
His family run an engineering business and many of his extended family live on the same small road.
Northern Ireland has come under UK lockdown rules, but McKenna has been able to train with his cousins.
McKenna usually drops into his former club, Eglish St Patrick’s, and has been known to train with the team when home, but all sports have been called off in Northern Ireland.
Some at the club this week recalled how McKenna would “ghost up the field” during training because he was so fast.
McKenna went back to Ireland with teammates Cian McBride and Ross McQuillan and they trained together for two weeks at a holiday house in Donegal on Ireland’s west coast when they first arrived.
The reluctant star also revealed how the club supported him earlier this year when he wanted to go home.
“I just finished training and a couple of times I was in tears just walking off, just didn’t know what it was so I walked into one of the boys in the club and said to them I wanted to go home and just see what happens,” he said.
“The club has always been really good, they said if you were homesick they’re always happy for you to go home for a few weeks.
“That was on a Monday at two o’clock and I flew out at 10 o’clock that night.”
Essendon’s patience may pay dividends.
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McKenna, who was contracted until 2021, was now talking about another “one to three years” at the Bombers.
McKenna, who would play for County Tyrone in the Gaelic Athletic Association, who are currently in the mix.
He wants to emulate Sydney’s Tadhg Kennelly, who starred with the Swans in the 2005 premiership and then went back to win an All-Ireland Championship for County Kerry.
“I want to come home before I’m done playing Gaelic. I always have and will have an ambition to come home in the next few years,” he said.
“I’ve considered it every year to be honest and I have always weighed things up.
“At the end of the day it’s my decision if I think it’s the right time to go home.”