New York born and bred Mikey Brosnan didn't want to take match winning penalty against Leitrim

One of the many fairytale aspects of New York’s historic Connacht Championship victory over New York was the fact that the winning spot kick in the penalty shootout was taken by native New Yorker Mikey Brosnan - even if the goal scoring hero didn’t want to take a penalty!

Standing over the fifth New York in a tumultuous penalty shootout that saw just one of the first eight penalties missed, Brosnan told the Irish Examiner that he didn’t want to take one. I said no to taking one and he said it was either me or Jamie Boyle and I figured I’d definitely have a better chance of scoring one than Jamie!

“I actually asked when Jack was going to take his, ‘if he scores this, is it over?’ I really didn’t want to take one. But they told me no and I knew it was coming down to me. 

Brosnan and Boyle and his brother Shane are one of three American born New York players and given all the hype about players being imported in the New York side, it was interesting to hear that current manager John McGeeney insisted on developing a pathway for native players to line out for the New York senior team.

It certainly paid off for New York last Saturday but Brosnan was downplaying his role in the historic victory: “Everyone’s coming up to me but that was just kicking a ball. The real work was done by the likes of Johnny Glynn and Rob Wharton, they could barely walk by the end. It’s easy to just go up and kick a penalty.”

New York natives Mikey and Shane Brosnan spoke to @Darrenfrehill after their team's historic Connacht SFC championship win over Leitrim. Full story: https://t.co/ZGjfFc1lsK #GAA pic.twitter.com/Z8LQZinf1R

— RTÉ GAA (@RTEgaa) April 10, 2023