Hoops history an incentive for motivated Aaron Greene

At Shamrock Rovers there is no escaping the club's history. Hoops players entering Tallaght Stadium walk past a mural with all the club’s league (17) and cup (24) trophies listed year by year.

Adjacent to the home dressing room there is some space – and the aim for Rovers is that an FAI Cup will be painted there after this Sunday’s FAI Cup final against Dundalk.

It is of course 32 years since the Hoops last lifted the cup but striker Aaron Greene feels that the club’s FAI Cup famine can be used as motivation. “For me I use it as an incentive,” said Greene when he sat down with extratime.ie at Rovers’ Academy in Roadstone in the build-up to Sunday’s game.

“We can be the group that can right that and bring a bit of success to the club which hasn’t had silverware in recent years. You hear a lot of background noise about the cup through the media and the fans. I’d be up here (at Roadstone) coaching and the fans are going ‘you better win’. 

“I wouldn’t take it as pressure. It is a massive club that has been starved for success in the league in the last eight years and in FAI Cup for 32 years. That is a great incentive for us as the gaffer always says the good teams have to win something.

"You can’t always be ‘we will finish second and be beaten in the FAI Cup and go that is a good year’. You have to go and do something.

“All the hard work that we have put in, like coming back early in December, you are fighting for league titles and FAI Cups and this is where this club should be. You see the buzz about the place. It is great to see. All the kids are all talking about it.” 

Greene won FAI Cups with Sligo Rovers either side of a disappointing spell at Shamrock Rovers during Stephen Kenny’s short managerial tenure in Tallaght in 2012.

The 29-year-olds player’s return to Rovers last season under Stephen Bradley wasn’t met with universal approval by Hoops supporters and there was grumbling about the quantity of misses he built up in front of goal.

However, Greene who hails from Kilnamanagh, never shirked the effort in leading the line on his own for Rovers and had a very strong second half to the season in particular. He had a spell where he scored 10 goals in 14 games.



He has played a very important role at Rovers helping the Hoops to runners up spot in the league (top scoring with 11 goals) and scoring in the last three rounds of the FAI Cup.

“For me 100% I know I should have got more goals definitely. Overall I’m happy but a bit unhappy as personally I know I should have got a lot more with those chances that I missed. Hopefully I can make it four goals in the cup on Sunday. 

“We haven’t had it too easy in the cup this season. We had a tough draw at home to Finn Harps and they came and stifled us and we only won 1-0. In the second game we had Drogheda but we won 4-0. In Galway, we were 1-0 down with Lee Grace getting the very late winner. Then there was away to Bohs.” 

Greene grabbed the second goal for Rovers in the 2-0 win in Dalymount Park and in the post-match celebrations endeared himself to Hoops supporters by hoisting his jersey onto the cornerflag – like Bohs players Keith Ward had done in Tallaght last season after a 2-1 win for the Gypsies.

Greene explained that the celebration was due to a request from his Hoops supporting son!

“My Dad and my son wanted to go to the game (at Dalymount) but personally I didn’t want them to. They have been at the last few derbies when we got beaten before the summer break and the one I was sent off in; I just thought the occasion of the game wasn’t right for my ten-year-old son to be at it. 



“Before the game my son said to me ‘will you do me a favour?’ I thought it might be bring him home a McDonalds after the game but he asked me to lift the cornerflag if we won because of what Wardy did in Tallaght!

“After the final whistle and especially after I scored, I did it. People thought it was to do with me getting sent off after that tackle on Wardy but it was to do with my son.”

After last Friday’s 3-0 win over Cork City, there was a prize ceremony for the players in front of the supporters in the 1899 Suite in Tallaght Stadium - with Jack Byrne winning player of the year and Brandon Kavanagh young player of the year.

As the players came in to the event, they all had a shoe box with them and on closer inspection they had been given their Massimo Dutti shoes for the cup final.

The Hoops will be all suited and booted for the trip to Lansdowne this weekend.

This is in contrast to the 2002 final at Tolka Park when Rovers lost to Derry City. The Hoops, who were playing in the northside venue as a home ground at the time, treated the game like a normal home match and arrived in their club tracksuits. For many the tone of the defeat was set with that decision.

This time around the match day attire will be sharper and the training ground preparation and the match day preparation is all in hand.

“Nothing needs to be done this week. When I was at Sligo we were collecting our suits on the Thursday before the cup final. We got them last week. Hopefully everything will look after itself on Sunday and we will be coming back to the Tallaght with the FAI Cup.” 

You can listen to the full interview with Aaron Greene on this week's extratime.ie Sportscast (see here).

    About Macdara Ferris

    Macdara Ferris is a contributor since 2007 to Hoops Scene (Shamrock Rovers' match day programme) and is the co-author of two books on Shamrock Rovers - 'Tallaght Time: Shamrock Rovers 2009 to 2012' (with Karl … View Full Profile