Cometh the hour, cometh the book

Well that was quick. Late November last year I was in Ballina for the launch of my old friend Henry Wills’ book In All Kinds of Weather. Fast forward to Ballina late November this year and as the world spins on its axis politically, Henry has long since departed this mortal coil leaving behind sadness but great memories. And to prove that the conveyor belt of life rolls on, beside my coffee and biscuits lies Edwin McGreal’s timely offering Our Finest Hour, a collection of reflections from each club in the great Plain of the Yews.

I’m not a Luddite, I know we have to adapt, store our information deep in the virtual bowels of a computer, laptop or iPad. All that then transferred into some cloud formation that we accept more easily than the concept of what lies beyond those self-same clouds. In other words, I like my books physical, hard or soft covered and accessible. ‘Pick me up, read me, stain me with crumbs and tea, put me down, come back but always love me for I am accessible and available.’ Edwin has done the county some service with this tome. As it says on the tin, it’s a compendium of the clubs’ finest hours. Not an easy task to balance. Take Ardnaree Sarsfields for example: what saw the Mayo junior title of 2015 picked out ahead of the 1971 title? That’s the beauty of this book. It forces you to think beyond what its chosen subject is, jogs your memory into other great days. By the way, I’m not looking down on 2015, no, but that piece took me back to the mainly black and white life of Ardnaree and Ballina 1971, a time of my teenage years around the town.

James Laffey’s Will Galway Beat Mayo uses the same technique as Edwin’s Our Finest Hour. Indeed both books can be joined, one county centric, the other club centric that links to the county. No club, no county. McGreal sets out his stall by using a bottom up method of interviewing. Like all great inquiries, those that start on the ground as opposed to top down, yield more fertile and truthful results. We hear what the foot soldier has to say. Today I think people would describe that as ‘granular’. We get close to the heart of the subject.

Every club is covered, every club gets equal page space. The mighty like Ballina Stephenites and Castlebar Mitchels are accorded the same space as Kilfian and Lacken. Indeed the book jolts you into asking the question, was Castlebar’s totemic 2015 victory over Corofin greater in the club’s fabric than say Kilfian’s 2020 Mayo junior ‘B’ victory over Tourmakeady? Castlebar stands on the broader shoulders of population and status whereas Kilfian, a small enclave, was formed in 1978 with tiny numbers. Whilst Kilfian would see that 2021 victory as the pinnacle of their relatively short existence, Castlebar could see the dark clouds of three All-Ireland final losses, unreflective of their actual ability proven by taking out the Corofins and Crossmaglens of this world.

Each club marches to its own tune. What Castlebar nor Ballina or the other big guns aspire to doesn’t take from what other clubs aspire to. We see in Edwin’s book the struggle of clubs like Lacken, Ballycastle, Ballycroy, Moygownagh, Ardagh and others, where the main objective is simply to survive. Survival then transfers into relevance and pride. Hence Lacken could bestow two players to the 1989 Mayo team that reached that year’s All-Ireland SFC final. Ardagh has the mercurial and unlucky (injury-wise) James Carr while Moygownagh had Pat Holmes and Anthony Finnerty, big time players. Ballycastle will always be the home of Team of the Millennium full-forward, Tom Langan. Ballycroy had the O’Sullivan brothers along with the likes of Micheál Padden and Francis Lynott. Every club has its reason to exist. Every club contributes. McGreal’s book tells us that graphically.

Like all good books, a pattern emerges. It runs along the lines of achievement, near misses, potential fully achieved, potential lost. Picked a year too soon or 10 years too late. Human stories told by human beings. Our Finest Hour has within it, nuggets that reveal much of the caste system that existed in gone by days in the Mayo hierarchy. Often we discover that gut feelings we had about certain players, clubs or county were actually true but not revealed in real time. Only with the passing of time were tongues loosened to call it as it was.

The chapter on Claremorris reveals much about Mayo football. How a blue blood club has drifted from the pack of my youth years, the 1960s early 1970s. That intersecting line of Galway’s John ‘Tull’ Dunne and an inept Mayo County Board is laid bare with Jimmy Duggan the meat in the sandwich. Mayo’s indifference and arrogance in overlooking Duggan for the 1964 minor team was quickly pounced upon by Tull in 1965 by luring the Claremorris native to Galway. Cormac Hanley tells of an approach by Galway’s 1960 All-Ireland winning minors whilst a student in Garbally where he played rugby. Mayo passed the first opportunity on Hanley, eventually picking him before leaving the county senior panel in 1965. His words were: “I was 22 but I was disgusted by the county set up.” Boy wonder Mick Connaughton and playing colleague of an old neighbour of mine, Eddie Maguire, both had the same story. Their instructions before the 1961 All-Ireland minor final was to be of their best behaviour and not disgrace the county. Clearly Cork rode under different instructions in a 3-7 to 0-5 beating of Mayo. They hit anything of use that Mayo had that day. At half-time, in Connaughton’s words, the “too many priests involved” changed their tune. Maguire, in conversation with me, told that all earlier instructions were off the table. Too late.

Garrymore’s Billy Fitzpatrick kicked 2-05 in a minor trial only to be told that he wouldn’t be picked because he wasn’t a college boy. Those men in black struck again. He was amongst a plethora of Garrymore men not picked for the county when in their prime. Many clubs regale that refrain in Edwin’s book, but surely Fitzpatrick was the unluckiest. Finally, as a selector was he given fresh air in a drawn All-Ireland semi-final in 1985, almost 40 then.

Regrets abound in the book. Burrishoole’s talisman Willie McGee, the flame haired full-forward of my youth and four-goal All-Ireland U21 winner, references the shadow of Tull Dunne again. Speaking about that fine 1967-70 Mayo senior team, almost with resignation, McGee notes: “We were too clean. Seamie never put badness into us compared to Tull Dunne in Galway.” The ‘Seamie’ was the Mulranny publican, and ex-Castlebar great, Seamie Daly, who was a successful manager for Mayo when the title manager didn’t exist and when they were encumbered with a plethora of selectors getting in their way.

The book is also littered with great pictures, black and white where the Achill goalkeeper John Cooney clears his line surrounded by followers on Keel sandbanks back in 1966. It’s so evocative of my youth that I can almost feel it. Another photograph, in colour, of twin small seaside towns wrestling for Connacht junior cup glory, sees two Clifden lads making a murderous attempt to drive a Killala player over the sideline. Caught up in the proceedings are the linesman, manager and supporters with only the whitewashed sideline separating the on field combatants from each other. The mucky days that bind player and follower, club and soul.

Each and every club has a story. Space won’t permit me to dwell. Knockmore’s sheer granite will and their success and simmering anger of how the county treated their stellar players seeps through. Ballaghaderreen, conjoined with the O’Mahony brothers and the absurd clerical rules of Maynooth 1972 that almost hindered a county title, to Hollymount and their respect for Knockmore who they described as ‘hard bastards’. Beating them in that 1990 county final was as sweet as the above ‘hard bastards’ infers. By the way, that’s the ultimate honour you can bestow on your opponent.

For all Crossmolina’s promise and generational talent of the late 1990s, it’s clear it blossomed and flourished thanks to the barely noticed but highly influential Thomas Jordan. Quiet, unassuming, astute and hard as nails when needed, Tom Nallen tells in the book how Jordan unlocked the potential into an All-Ireland Club title. Within the Islandeady chapter two pictures show the journey. Enda Kenny the early 20 something clubman, fair hair, long, staring into the camera fully intent on what lay ahead, which was the 1974 Mayo Junior championship. The next photo is taken in 1985, Islandeady now winning the West Mayo Junior championship. Enda is standing back left, suit, tie, ball in hand and wellies as trainer. The journey politically continued, the club connection was unwavering and continuous.

Finally, I come to the two clubs closest geographically to me from the parish of Kilmore Erris. They are Belmullet and Kiltane. I would be more familiar with those areas. Kiltane’s extraordinary achievement of staying 40 years senior in Mayo is noted. I recall both their consecutive junior and intermediate Mayo title wins in 1972 and ’73. The effect rippled into Belmullet following them onto the same two titles in 1973 and ’74. A rivalry was sharpened and I recall both sides parading around the Palm Court Ballroom in Belmullet, basking in the delight of their people.

There is a colour picture of Kiltane in 1972 before winning the North Mayo Junior final against Ballycroy. For me it’s a throwback, I went to St Muredach’s with five of that Kiltane team and knew many more of those lads; it’s hard to believe over 50 years have gone by. Richie Cosgrove was a fixture on those Kiltane sides; I recall him in the college, high ankle boots and as hard between the sticks as Offaly’s Martin Furlong was, so it’s no wonder Kiltane’s run was so long with lads like Dick around.

Belmullet, like Kiltane, I often feel are the forgotten of Mayo football. Too far back for most sides to travel too comfortably but far enough away to be ignored when picking county teams. The book picks the thread of the Comortas Péile na Gaeltachta win in 2010. It’s a nice note to settle on. Beating Kiltane in that semi-final cleared the airways for a win over Ardara. The chapter head is called ‘A Place To Call Home’. It tells the nomadic life the club had and the quest of one man who took on a global giant, Shell.

John Gallagher is the kind of of guy who makes things happen. With Ian MacAndrew amongst others, Belmullet found a permanent home outside the town on the Erris peninsula in Tallagh. Finding a home is one thing and as Our Finest Hour charts, how Shell parted with €500,000 to the club is quite another. Powerful but not universally loved, that allowed Gallagher to leverage from Shell the financial support needed for the club. The club raised €600k themselves and Roinn na Gaeltachta granted €820k. Officially opened in June 2010, the €100k made on sales over the Comortas weekend put a hole in the debt and by 2012 the debt was fully cleared. Lessons there on how to run a successful project.

According to the Irish Examiner, Vermillion Energy Corrib Ireland Ltd. paid out dividends of €686.95 million over the past two years. Maybe the Irish government might have been better off having the Belmullet GAA committee negotiating with Shell on behalf of the country all those years ago. The nation might have gotten a better deal.

Edwin McGreal has written a book that will be referred to time and time again going forward, a book that can be opened anywhere and digested, enjoyed and returned to at one’s leisure. It’s available in most book shops in the county. A great read that fills in many of the questions we ask about our county and of course, poses many more.