If you said to somebody, ‘What’s Ben Brosnan like?’, they wouldn’t know. “I’m not really an approachable person. Like, even doing these sorts of things,” Brosnan says.
hen the request came in to do this interview, the first thing Ben Brosnan thought was how to avoid it. He was half hoping his Wexford football manager, Shane Roche, would put the kibosh on interviews the week of their Tailteann Cup game against Offaly tomorrow.
Brosnan isn’t comfortable being a focal point off the pitch. The blond hair and the white boots he wore in his twenties might give the impression of someone who enjoyed it, but that’s not how he felt.
Brosnan (34) is at that stage of his playing career when others might be inclined to shine up their legacy; how they are good with younger players, how they love the responsibility that comes with being the experienced player. That’s not this story.
Brosnan calls himself out for not doing more and for largely keeping to himself in the Wexford panel over the years.
“There was more responsibility on me back then and it was something that I probably didn’t really take on. I wouldn’t have been someone that would have ever spoken in a dressing-room,” Brosnan tells the Irish Independent.
“Or I wouldn’t have been someone that would have probably carried myself the way I should have carried myself.
“I always took playing for Wexford very seriously. But, when I look back on it, I probably regret a lot of those years.”
Brosnan has played alongside some of Wexford’s finest footballers since making his debut in 2008.
He made his 150th inter-county appearance in the Division 4 league game against Leitrim in March. But there have been times when he found it difficult being in a group environment.
“I’m just not someone that’s very confident in a group of people. I always say, ‘Do I get energy from being by myself or do I get energy from being in a group of people?’ And I would say, like a lot of the time, I’m happy enough being by myself.
“For young people to come into the panel and probably see that you’re not as approachable or that you’re not someone they might have thought you were.
“I’ve heard over the last few years that I would be like a role model or somebody someone would look up to.
“Even though it’s hard for me to grasp. It is something you should actually embrace a small bit.
“Like, Cian Hughes is 18. He’s an excellent footballer and he’s in on the inter-county panel. Like, I should be speaking to him and saying, ‘You’re flying it’. I just never would have done that.”
Brosnan remembers a league game around a decade ago when the manager at the time brought him into the toilets at half-time at Wexford Park.
He wanted Brosnan to give the team talk instead of waiting for others to talk.
He was seen as their best player, so their best player should speak up. But instead of hoping to build up Brosnan’s confidence to talk, it had the opposite effect.
“I remember going back onto the field and I was terrified. I didn’t want to have to speak at half-time. I was probably 22 or 23. I probably said something stupid. I can’t remember what I said.”
While he said it to the manager after, there were other times through the years when he kept his discomfort to himself. “I would have kept that internally, which is probably worse. I wouldn’t have said, ‘Oh, just leave me alone here’. If you don’t feel comfortable doing it, you shouldn’t do it, I don’t think. You kind of learn that as you go along.”
Brosnan says he’s becoming better at speaking in the dressing-room and listens to podcasts to help with his confidence.
Since his two close friends – Brian Malone and Dáithí Waters – retired last season, Brosnan has talked more openly to other teammates than before.
He was captain of Wexford, which he’ll always be very proud of, in 2020 and last year. But he didn’t want to be captain this year as he felt one of the younger players should now carry the mantle.
“I remember times last year where I knew I might have to say something in either meetings or going down to a match.
“I remember going down the whole way in the car and saying something out loud and next thing it comes to the dressing-room and I don’t say anything. And then you’re just saying something to say something. Now, I’m probably talking way more this year and it’s fine.”
Another reason Brosnan says he didn’t engage with more people in previous Wexford panels was because he didn’t want to “rub off as being negative”.
There were times when he felt there was too much negativity in the panel.
“That’s probably why we are where we are for the last five or six years because there’s been a lot of egos. Like, if people aren’t playing, they’re p****d off and if people aren’t playing, they’re negative towards other people and there’s a bad kind of vibe.
“There’s been players that probably didn’t have the team or Wexford football in their best interest – they were only worried about themselves.
“That’s not always people on the first 15 or people that might have been there for five or seven years that aren’t starting. It can be someone that’s just maybe only in there for five or six weeks at the end of the year or maybe only in there at the start of the year. I just don’t like that sort of trait in someone.
“I probably notice that straight away and then I just wouldn’t be dealing or interacting with that person.”
Brosnan credits Shane Roche with changing the atmosphere.
He speaks with admiration for the younger players – “they’re absolutely excellent footballers, they’re excellent men” – in the current panel who talk openly in ways he couldn’t at their age.
“There’s more of a team connection. If you’re not playing, you’re going to be p****d off, that’s fine. But it’s not a case of, ‘I should be playing, he’s s**t, why is he playing?’ There’s more of a grown-up discussion about it.
“Shane is very approachable that way. I think that the whole culture around it seems to have changed because of him. There’s nobody really moping around or there’s nobody being negative – especially if it’s a big personality.”
How did Paul Galvin fit into this mix as manager in his one-season stint two years ago?
“I thought Paul was brilliant. He brought me on hugely – I think just my movement and stuff that I never did before. He’s a very good coach,” Brosnan says. “I wouldn’t have a bad word to say about him, and like, I know a lot of people in Wexford wouldn’t have a good word to say about him.”
Brosnan says he doesn’t get the feeling this season will be his last as an inter-county player.
He again showed his value to the team, scoring 1-8 (1-4 from play), in their Leinster Championship win over Offaly last month.
As well as an improving diet and reducing muscle he put on during lockdown (down from 81kg to 75kg), his sleeping is better after spending a few years getting only three-four hours a night.
In 2015, he set up a new business – bodibro (a sportswear company) – and it was the birth of his and Annie’s first son, Benji (now two-and-a-half), that improved his sleeping.
“I feel I’m able to keep weight off better. I feel like I’m in a lot better form. I feel fresher – very few things would p**s me off compared to what they used to – like stupid stuff!”
The low of the Dublin defeat at Wexford Park six days after the high of the Offaly win was “difficult”.
He felt so in tune against Offaly, but he remembers looking up at the clock after 20 minutes against Dublin and he hadn’t even touched the ball.
Now they’re fighting for their summer against Offaly again at Wexford Park tomorrow. The Tailteann Cup? He spoke to his teammates about this.
“This is the one thing I said to the lads. I’ve played for 16 years. I’ve won one league final. I’ve lost two league finals, two Leinster finals. I’ve played on, supposedly, all the great Wexford teams and we’ve won nothing.
“I said we’re in no position to take this for granted. It’s a chance to win a national title, it’s a chance to win something in Croke Park on the day of the All-Ireland semi-final. It means a lot to me, to be honest.”
They sound very much like the right words, at the right time, from the right person – the veteran who always had the best interests of Wexford football at heart.
