Belief the key for football fanatics Strokestown ahead of Moycullen Connacht clash

Anyone who witnessed Moycullen hammering Westport by 12 points last weekend would fear for Strokestown on Sunday.

They could even suggest that the Roscommon champions need a miracle to stop the Galway kingpins in their Connacht SFC semi-final clash in Tuam.

But that might suit just fine for a town where Gaelic football is "a bit of a religion for many people", according to full-forward Colin Compton.

"There's no hurling, rugby is not really there. Soccer… Gaelic football is king. It’s all that’s talked about in the pubs, after mass, it’s the topic of conversation."

Being underdogs is also a familiar situation for a team that took a winding route to their first county title since 2022 last month.

"It was pretty special," Compton told RTÉ Sport. "Twenty years is a long time for a town like Strokestown without a county title.

"In 2012 we won the minor and U21 in the one year. Everyone expected that to materialise into [senior] county titles. It hadn’t and it was a tough road. We were maybe naïve, we thought it would come a lot handier to us when we first came on the scene.

"When it didn’t happen maybe we lost a bit of confidence. But we kept at it and 10 years later, we finally got over the line. It probably makes it all the sweeter.

"John [Rogers] and his management team came in last year and we made huge strides. We were very competitive. We got knocked out by Brigid’s, who would always be there or thereabouts. But we gave them a good game. So we knew we had made good improvements and this year was just about building on that.

"We had a rough start to the year with injuries and form. We ended up getting relegated in the league. But our luck started changing in June/July. Injuries started clearing up. A couple of results fell our