New Westmeath football selector Larry Giles is delighted to be involved with the county set-up once again - 15 years after he brought the curtain down on a decade-long playing career with the Lake County.

A firm favourite with Westmeath supporters whose only rewards during a stellar inter-county career were O'Byrne Cup and National League Division 4 medals in 1988 and '94 respectively, Larry Giles is looking forward to his new role as a county selector and the prospect of the Lake County making waves in the season ahead.
Giles, who many regard as one of the best forwards the county has ever produced, links up with Pat Flanagan and former team-mate Tom Darcy in the new management set-up. Giles and Darcy soldiered together for much of their inter-county careers and the Coralstown/Kinnegad clubman admits the involvement of the former Rosemount full back in Pat Flanagan's backroom team heavily influenced his decision to come on board.
"I got a call from Pat last October about becoming a selector and once I heard that Tom was going to be involved, I couldn't turn it down," he recalls.
"Myself and Tom go back a long way and it's great to be working with him again, albeit in a different capacity this time. But there were other reasons why I decided to join the management. The desire was there to get back involved again. I have managed a few teams at club level and I looked upon it as a great opportunity to learn more and further my management career.
"Pat Flanagan is committed to carrying out a major rebuilding job and I'm looking forward to being part of that."
Westmeath are currently in heavy transition with most of the 2004 Leinster championship winning team retired and younger players emerging to take their places. Despite the many changes to the side, Giles sees no reason why success can't be attained in the coming months.
"From watching club football in the county, the talent is certainly there. It's just a matter of trying to harness that," he says.
"As bad as things seemed last year, Westmeath were still only a kick of a ball away from reaching a Leinster final. We've since lost Derek Heavin, Martin Flanagan and Damien Healy to retirement, but we have young lads coming off last year's under 21 team which reached the Leinster final. And Division 3 is an ideal place to blood them."
According to Larry, Westmeath's objectives for 2011 are to win promotion from Division 3 of the National League and to reach the Leinster final.
"We'll be going all out for promotion in the league and then we'd hope to give the championship a good rattle. We've been handed a favourable championship draw which gives us a realistic chance of getting to a Leinster final. Hopefully, it's a chance we'll be able to take," he says.
Best remembered for his ability to throw defenders off balance with his famous sidestep and shoot points from all kinds of unlikely angles, Larry never got the recognition he deserved at national level because of Westmeath's lowly status for most of his career. He played in the 1984 Leinster minor final, which the Lake County lost to Dublin, before going on to make his senior championship debut in a 1-5 to 0-15 defeat to Wicklow two years later.
In the years that followed, Larry became all too familiar with first round championship exits. After beating a strong Laois team in the 1988 O'Byrne Cup final, Westmeath seemed poised to make a big impact in that year's Leinster championship, only to come a cropper against Longford in the first round.
The early 1990s were among the bleakest years in the history of Westmeath football. In 1990, the team took two unmerciful beatings from Galway and Offaly in Ballinasloe and Moate respectively. 
"It was difficult to see any light at the end of the tunnel," Larry remembers. 
"Things had got so bad that we were struggling to put a team out on the field. There was a terrible lack of interest. We had good players, and had been unlucky to lose to Offaly in the 1989 Leinster championship in Tullamore, but interest was at an all-time low and lads didn't want the hassle."
Then, in 1992, Mattie Kerrigan - who had guided Coralstown/Kinnegad to a county final appearance against Mullingar Shamrocks two years earlier - agreed to manage Westmeath just a few weeks before they were due to play Carlow in the first round of the Leinster championship.
The Barrowsiders were duly dispatched before Westmeath went on to give the Mick O'Dwyer-managed Kildare a big fright in the provincial semi-final. Westmeath continued to improve over the next few years with the highpoint of the Kerrigan era being the sensational National League quarter-final victory over All-Ireland champions Derry on Easter Sunday 1994.
The Lake County's star performer on that rain-soaked afternoon in Enniskillen was Larry, who scored 2-2 and was named Irish Independent Sports Star of the Week and GAA Player of the Month (he previously won the Westmeath Footballer of the Year award in 1987).
Although Westmeath suffered a narrow National League semi-final defeat to Meath and Kerrigan stepped down as manager in 1995 following a disastrous championship loss to Wicklow, the Summerhill native's time in the midlands had changed attitudes forever. It's widely acknowledged that the 1994 National League run was the catalyst for the All-Ireland minor and under 21 successes in 1995 and '99, as well as for the Leinster senior triumph in 2004.
"Mattie brought a professional approach to the set-up. He put the pride back in the Westmeath jersey," Larry fondly remembers.
"He won an All-Ireland medal with Meath and knew what was needed to be successful. He had a great way with the players and got the kids interested. It was the first time I ever saw supporters wearing the Westmeath jersey. I can still remember the huge reception we got in Kinnegad on our return from Croke Park (after the Meath match). But we didn't win, that was the disappointing side of it."
Giles retired after Westmeath's defeat to Dublin in the 1996 Leinster championship, having had two knee operations. However, he continued his club career with Coralstown/Kinnegad and was a key figure in the their Flanagan Cup success later that year. Coralstown/Kinnegad also contested county finals in 1997 and '98, but lost to Moate All-Whites and Athlone respectively.
"That team probably should have won more than one championship," contends Larry, who won senior hurling championship medals with Raharney in 1992 and '94.
"Mullingar Shamrocks had a packed team at the time and we lost a few semi-finals to them as well as the final in 1990. They even beat us in the 1988 intermediate final, but we still ended up getting promoted because it was their second team that beat us."
After hanging up his boots, Larry had spells in charge of Meath club sides Longwood and Ballivor, achieving back-to-back league promotions with the former. He then returned to manage his beloved Coralstown/Kinnegad for two years before managing the club's ladies team along with his brother-in-law Jack Cooney. In 2009, he was a mentor with the Coralstown/Kinnegad under 14 team which won the club's first Feile na nOg title.
Married to Lourda, Larry has four boys - Alan, Mark, Darren and David. Alan played in this year's O'Byrne Cup campaign and has won three senior hurling championship medals with Raharney. Mark plays minor football for Coralstown/Kinnegad, Darren is on the under 16 team, while David is with the under 10s.
Like all Coralstown/Kinnegad supporters, Larry was gutted by last year's shock relegation from the senior ranks and has stressed the need for the club to bounce back quickly.
"It's important that we win the intermediate championship at the first attempt. Jack Cooney is over the team and he won't be settling for anything less. If we don't get out of intermediate this year, we could be there for a few years and that wouldn't be a good thing," he concludes.
 
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