There seems to have been plenty of chat about the ‘Bygone Days’ article, we got some feedback via facebook with regard to this which is to be encouraged. I was thinking recently about where the games between us were played. I remember Annsboro played on the green in Annsboro Park but I can’t recall where Burren Grove played their home games, Did they even have a home pitch? I can’t recall either where The Crescent played home matches, did they just play in the ‘Meadow’. Maybe Joe Lennon, Paddy O’Rourke or Ocky McVeigh can enlighten us. As regards Mill Hill we used to play up at Maginn’s field in Drumee, I was up there about a year ago and it’s so small I can’t believe we were able to have a meaningful game on it, but when you are 10/11 it doesn’t need to be that big. Occasionally James Maginn himself would dander bye tending his live stock and often would stop and watch the game for a while usually along with young Paddy ( now proprietor of Quinns in Newcastle) and Brendan (now proprietor of Maginns in the town). At lambing season however he would politely chase us for a few weeks understandably (although we didn’t understand it!) when this occured we had to settle for a small bit of rough ground where the top of Station Avenue is now. We moved down to Clarkill in 1970 and played at Keown’s farm, firstly at the front of their house but as it was too bumpy we moved to a field up behind the house and I talked my father into putting up goalposts for us which he duly did. We rarely had a decent ball and usually played with a deflated or burst one and on the few occasions that someone brought a decent ball it usually ended up burst in the thorn hedge behind one of the goals. We stayed there for a couple of years and moved to the Demesne and played at the dam that is behind the wood opposite the ‘Blue Row’. Another venue was the site of the old castle which was just the right size for 5 a side and had a fabulous surface but we were constantly on the look out for the park ranger who would regularly chase us. Eventually we moved up to the intermediate school and used the hockey pitch, but it all fizzled out about 1973ish when we all found more interesting things to do – if you get my drift! Its a pity but you don’t see a crowd of young lads doing that any more, two piles of coats and jumpers at either end of a piece of grass and the match could go on for hours, many a time it was darkness that proved to be the only final whistle. Incidently the very first game between the four teams was Mill Hill versus The Crescent up at Drumee (early 1968ish) and it ended up 1-0 to Mill Hill with Mervyn ‘bentley’ McNeill scoring and by an amazing coincidence the very last game which was played was on the old gaelic pitch at the back of St Malachy’s school (Summer 1973ish) ended up 1-0 to Mill Hill with Mervyn scoring again.
There were some interesting characters around at the time and I suppose none more interesting than Larry Boden. I first met Larry on April 1st 1969, strange that I should remember with such accuracy (but my birthday is exactly a week afterwards). It was Paddy O’Rourke’s birthday and his mother had a party for him. I arrived late to find the aforementioned larry on top of a chair in the kitchen with one of Mrs O’Rourke’s brushes playing along to ‘Get off my cloud’ by the Rolling Stones. We became firm friends and when he learned that I was getting a new pair of football boots for my birthday he asked me if he could buy my old ones. We agreed on a half crown for my boots and that he would tap his mother and give it to me down at our Clarkill pitch the following weekend. 44 years later I’m still waiting for the money! He had called up for the boots one evening and when he arrived down at the pitch on the Saturday he claimed to have lost the half crown. He couldn’t explain away however the big bag of sweets, crisps and minerals he had in his possession. There was plenty of incriminating evidence against him and Sherlock Holmes wouldn’t even have had to light the pipe to get to the bottom of it but I was no barrister and gave it up as a bad debt.
Some more participants in those games were James White, Brendan Nixon, and Eugene Milligan who played for Annsboro and Squire Hanna, Cathal Keown RIP and I think Charlie McAlinden for the Crescent and for ourselves I forgot about Bertie McCammon, no doubt I’m missing a host of others, again maybe Joe Lennon, Ocky can fill in a few blanks.
In 1972 an amalgamation of some of the players played in several 7 a side tournaments and this very grainy photo is the only picture of the team
Team:- top row from left Davy Hutchman, Paddy O’Rourke, Paul McFlynn, Kevin Murray, Joe Ward, Bottom Row from left Tommy White, Joe Russell, Jimmy McVeigh, Raymond Burns, Mervyn McNeill.
It’s not a very good picture and I’ll try and improve upon it but I’ll bet nobody has seen it for 40 years. That particular evening we were playing a team called Slieve Donard at Donard Park they were basically Newcastle’s youth team and they beat us 2-1. Missing from the photo was Ocky McVeigh as he had broken his collar bone during the previous game, also missing was Donal O’Rourke who wasn’t the required age (under 15). I know we didn’t win that tournament but we did win a couple that summer.
Bring back any memories to anyone – Discuss.
