“He’s picked up niggly injuries…probably been unfortunate at times” – Costello finally ready to make it his own

The year is 2012 and Cormac Costello is the hottest ticket in Dublin.

He's the main man for the Dublin minor footballers and he's the main man for the hurlers too. They coast to Leinster glory in both and the Whitehall-Colmcille gem is rampant. On they go, the Sky Blues cleaning out all before them on their way to All-Ireland finals in the two codes but none of the rising stars -from Niall Scully to Eric Lowndes, is spoken of in the awed tones Costello is. And it's easy to see why. He put in a regal campaign for the footballers - hitting 3-4 in the Leinster final against Meath while bossing it in midfield for the hurlers, as natural a hurler as they've seen in these parts for a long time. There aren't many GAA players to have won All-Ireland minor medals in both codes in the same year - but the Whitehall-Colmcille gem gave it one hell of a try. He starred in the football final, hitting Meath for five points in the decider and he nearly drove Dublin to the elusive double - only for Tipperary to undo the dream in a replay. But that didn't change things. Costello had it all, speed, strength, skill and composure and whatever way he chose to go - with the hurlers or the footballers - he was going to go on and dominate for years in the Dublin jersey. Off the bat, he went with the football and he was ready to take off when he went in with the footballers in 2013. That's six years ago now, and Costello is still yet to nail down his place in the Dublin forward line. Dublin have played 39 championship games since his championship debut against Donegal and he's only started eighteen. Peripherality wasn't what was predicted for this prodigious talent all those years ago, but when you consider that he's trying to break into the most competitive forward line of all time, you begin to understand. And then there's the injuries. Costello had a lot of them, none-more-so than in 2017 when he pulled his hamstring three times. So on the back of that, his contribution hasn't been all that pitiful - it's easy to forget his three point cameo off the bench that won Sam in 2016. But still, more was expected, and in the league so far this year, Costello is letting us have it. He's won two man-of-the-match awards at centre forward in the last three weekends and just last Saturday he hit Mayo for 1-4. https://twitter.com/GAA__JOE/status/1099389155983933440 If he keeps up this form into the championship, he'll be undroppable and one man who's delighted to see it come together for him is teammate Cian O'Sullivan. O'Sullivan has seen what Costello can do in training, he knows about the injuries that have held him back but he's backing Costello to make it count this time around. Similar to Costello, Evan Comerford in the goals is another young gun who's showing well and O'Sullivan has been very impressed with him too.