THERE ar a couple of past echoes for Dave Foran as he brings Wicklow to Croke Park tomorrow to play Donegal in their quarter final of the National Football League, sponsored by Church and General.

Exactly five years ago Wicklow played Dublin in the 1991 quarter final: Foran was playing for Dublin, then in the full bloom of Paddy Cullen's first year and on their way to the League title, before all that promise was ground to dust by the four matches against Meath.

Wicklow were also doing well and lost honourably, but like that Dublin team, they found a championship breakthrough impossible to conic by. Eventually it was Dave Foran who dismantled Wicklow and rebuilt the team which won this season's Division Four.

Even that nearly didn't happen, as a lengthy disciplinary sentence last autumn imposed for playing with his club while under suspension, albeit unwittingly - threatened to abort Foran's managerial career.

"When I was suspended, my only thought was on the playing side. It was only when I was driving home that I realised I could be in trouble on the management side," he says.

Fortunately for him, the spirit rather than the letter of the law prevailed and he was free to resume duties after having being forced to step down when the punishment was originally handed out. Resignation would have been a bit of a waste after all the plans he had laid for the team.

Since then, things have gone very satisfactorily for Wicklow and promotion from the fourth division has been finally attained after a couple of years of endeavour. More radically, the team has been reshaped with a substantial injection of new talent, mostly from An Tochar, the county champions, who last year broke Baltinglass's nine year stranglehold on the title.

These additions have, according to Foran, been at the heart of the county's mini renaissance. "The new players have brought youth and freshness into the team, fellas that never played before who have given a lift to the likes of Kevin O'Brien and Hugh Kenny and done a great job."

A winner of Leinster medals with Dublin in three decades, Foran's seniority brought with it a thoughtful authority acknowledged by Dublin players of recent years that changed easily into managerial potential. He led Dublin's juniors to a Leinster title two years ago before taking on the Wicklow job.

Management's learning curve has been steep. After a disappointing failure to secure promotion in last season's league, Wicklow started the championship well by travelling to Westmeath and recording an unexpected and convincing victory. But disaster followed.

A bad start against Meath was compounded by a listless performance and a nasty trimming. Foran had no choice but to learn.

"Without doubt, you learn as you go along. The hammering by Meath taught me a lot. We weren't as good as I had thought and you could see the gap between fourth division football and first, the difference in pace. We were a yard slower - I had thought we were faster than that.

"Basically, last year and the year before there was a settled panel. I hadn't time to make big changes (when originally appointed), so I went with what was there. Last summer I was at a lot of games in the county, just looking, and then was in a position to disband the panel."

Wicklow had threatened quite a bit in the 1990s, but never delivered at senior championship level. Under Niall Rennick, they were a respected team in the League and won a B competition in 1992, but never progressed beyond coming close in the summer.

Changes in personnel were therefore inevitable. In addition, Foran has looked at the type of game played by the team and modified the old short passing style in favour of something more direct. This has placed a bit of a burden on players, particularly An Tochar's, who are used to playing a short game with their club.

"I want the game played fast and simple, says Foran. "There's a lot of younger guys want to play on the ball and don't want them doing that they can go for the return it they want. I want the ball in flights in movement. It'll be a while before it's the finished article, but they're willing to work, to give it a go.

"I wouldn't have called it (Wicklow's previous style) possession football. I know it was, but I wouldn't say we don't play possession now. You can keep the ball with a good 50 yard pass as well as with a short hand pass. We're more direct.

"You've got to be able, when you've got the ball, to give your team mate an advantage, to lay off the ball so that he's got a 55-45 chance and should win it, if he doesn't, he shouldn't be on the team."

Progress has been rewarding. As one observer in the county puts it: "You couldn't ask any more of him (Foran). He's won Division Four and won the O'Byrne Cup with a young side, and the platform's there."

Foran was pleased with the O'Byrne Cup victory. As Leinster's secondary competition, it doesn't have an infallible track record as an indicator of good things to come, but a cup is a cup: "There was a huge buzz. For me the O'Byrne Cup started like a challenge match, but as we won and morale went up. I realised how important it was.

"To win a trophy means something. It might be only a minor trophy, but for players who've maybe never won anything, even with their clubs it was tremendous. Winning becomes a habit.

The winning, though, has come at a cost to long term preparations and the sort of hard labour terms need to have under their belt by the spring.

"We haven't been doing any since January," says Foran. "We meant to be doing stamina work but haven't been able to. In the last 10 weeks, we've had nine matches between the O'Byrne Cup and the League, which makes it hard to do the heavy work."

The season's modest achievements haven't unbalanced Foran's view of the world and Wicklow's place in it for the foreseeable future.

"Long term, I'm looking no further than next year and trying to get into Division Two. People say to me: `Are you not aiming for a Leinster title?' and I say `No'. Leinster titles don't come out of the blue. We've just got into Division Three. I'm not going to say, `Oh, let's win Leinster', because we have to get up to at least Division Two so that we can become competitive and then take it from there."

Tomorrow will be an interesting test, but nothing more. Foran may care to remind the team that in the year Donegal won the All Ireland, their only two competitive defeats came in the League against Dublin, in the quarter final, and before that, against Wicklow.

His public attitude to tomorrow is conventional but doubtless heartfelt. "We'll go out and give it a go Our view it is like a championship match. We're not thinking about being outsiders. Deep down, we think we can win."