Archive News
Brilliant Bane is Caherlistrane’s key performer
Date Published: 02-Jun-2010
LED by a fantastic display from Cormac Bane, Caherlistrane were deserving winners of their Claregalway Hotel Galway Senior Football Championship backdoor match on Sunday despite having to save a penalty late in the second half to do so.
While An Cheathrú Rua held the majority of possession, they were unable to capitalise and give enough quality ball into a full forward line that looked dangerous anytime it was given a chance.
The match was won and lost in the contrasting fortunes of the team’s half forward lines.
For Caherlistrane, Bane put on master class display in linking defence and attack while taking scores himself when called upon.
An Cheathrú Rua’s half forward line on the other side were non-existent and it was left up to an industrious midfield and half back line to supply the final ball that, all too often, was lacking in precision.
The game began somewhat tentatively and despite an early score from Caherlistrane’s Shane Bohan after a 30 yard solo run, it took time to settle down as both teams played with the nerves natural to a knockout championship encounter.
Caherlistrane were quicker to breaking ball during the fractured first quarter of the match and found themselves leading 0-5 to 0-1, taking some opportunistic scores, the pick of which was a fine effort by J.J Greaney in the 12th minute.
An Cheathrú Rua continued to struggle to find that all important final ball despite winning their share of possession, epitomised best when Micheál Ó Briain soared above his man to field a kick out only to land the pass twenty metres into the terraces.
Not to be disheartened, they continued to work tirelessly, particularly when tackling defenders in possession with Shane Ó Súilleabháin at corner forward covering every blade of grass possible.
That effort paid off in the 22nd minute when Tomas Monahan lazily kicked a free back across his own 21 which was intercepted brilliantly by Ciarán de Paor who instantly found his brother Cillín in support. After a quick hand pass exchange between the two, which stranded Philip Skelly in the Caherlistrane goal, Cillín buried the ball in the back of an open net and the match suddenly jumped into life.
An Cheathrú Rua started to play much better after the goal and began to get some purchase out of the Caherlistrane defence whenever they could isolate them one on one. However, Bane and Greaney stepped up for the north Galway outfit and played patient football keeping possession well to stem the momentum building, helping their side to maintain their advantage and enter the break leading 0-7 to 1-2.
The pace of the contest increased significantly in the second half as An Cheathrú Rua threw everything into a last effort to stay in the championship. The de Paor brothers in particular sparkled into form and after a well worked point by Barry McCabe for Caherlistrane, Cillín and Ciarán de Paor combined for three points in the space of five minutes to level proceedings at 1-5 to 0-8 points ten minutes into the second half.
Despite Bane and Greaney once again combining to restore Caherlistrane’s two point lead, the men from the Gaeltacht were beginning to dominate possession. Ciarán Ó Cualáin was particularly impressive at midfield alongside his partner Micheál Ó Briain whose delivery into the full-forward line improved as the match progressed.
It was during this stretch of dominance that Gearóid Ó Conghaile was hauled down in the small rectangle after picking up a dropped ball by Brendan Murphy while attempting to come out of defence. Shane Ó Súilleabháín, who had been fantastic for An Cheathrú Rua all through, failed to connect as he would have wished, sending a weak shot to the bottom left corner which was easily stopped by Skelly in the Caherlistrane goal.
Shortly afterwards, Ó Cualáin missed another golden opportunity from five yards out after fielding a ball sent in by Ciarán de Paor. Despite the two misses, the momentum was with An Cheathrú Rua who levelled up the scoreline with two Ciarán de Paor points, the second coming with five minutes to play.
From there until the end, however, it was the Cormac Bane show. First he set up Eric Monahan for the lead point before kicking over two further points in the last three minutes to seal the win for Caherlistrane.
An Cheathrú Rua had calls for a foot block late into injury time in front of their goal, but it was waved away and they never came any closer than that to getting the second goal they needed
People’s living conditions less than 100 years ago were frightening. We have come a long way. We talk about water charges today, but back then the local District Councils were erecting pumps for local communities and the lovely town of Mountbellew, according to Council minutes, had open sewers,” says Galway County Council archivist Patria McWalter.
Patria believes we “need to take pride in our history, and we should take the same pride in our historical records as we do in our built heritage”. When you see the wealth of material in her care, this belief makes sense.
She is in charge of caring for the rich collection of administrative records owned by Galway County Council and says “these records are as much part of our history as the Rock of Cashel is. They document our lives and our ancestors’ lives. And nobody can plan for the future unless you learn from the past, what worked and what didn’t”.
Archivists and librarians are often unfairly regarded as being dry, academic types, but that’s certainly not true of Patria. Her enthusiasm is infectious as she turns the pages of several minute books from Galway’s Rural District Councils, all of them at least 100 years old.
Part of her role involved cataloguing all the records of the Councils – Ballinasloe, Clifden, Galway, Gort, Loughrea, Mountbellew, Portumna and Tuam. These records mostly consisted of minutes of various meetings.
When she was cataloguing them she realised their worth to local historians and researchers, so she decided to compile a guide to their content. The result is For the Record: The Archives of Galway’s Rural District Councils, which will be a valuable asset to anybody with an interest in history.
Many representatives on these Councils were local personalities and several were arrested during the political upheaval of the era, she explains.
And, ushering in a new era in history, women were allowed to sit on these Rural District Councils – at the time they were not allowed to sit on County Councils.
All of this information is included in Patria’s introductory essay to the attractively produced A4 size guide, which gives a glimpse into how these Rural Councils operated and the way political thinking changed in Ireland during a short 26-year period. In the early 1900s, these Councils supported Home Rule, but by 1920, they were calling for full independence and refusing to recognise the British administration.
“I love the tone,” says Patria of the minutes from meetings. “The language was very emotive.”
That was certainly true of the Gort Rural District Council. At a meeting in 1907, following riots in Dublin at the premiere of JM Synge’s play, The Playboy of the Western World the councillors’ response was vehement. They recorded their decision to “protest most emphatically against the libellous comedy, The Playboy of the Western World, that was belched forth during the past week in the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, under the fostering care of Lady Gregory and Mr Yeats. We congratulate the good people of Dublin in howling down the gross buffoonery and immoral suggestions that are scattered throughout this scandalous performance.
For more from the archives see this week’s Tribunes here
Date Published: 23-Jan-2013
SLIGO 0-9
GALWAY 1-4
FRANK FARRAGHER IN ENNISCRONE
GALWAY’S first serious examination of the 2013 season rather disturbingly ended with a rating well below the 40% pass mark at the idyllic, if rather Siberian, seaside setting of Enniscrone on Sunday last.
The defeat cost Galway a place in the FBD League Final against Leitrim and also put a fair dent on their confidence shield for the bigger tests that lie ahead in February.
There was no fluke element in this success by an understrength Sligo side and by the time Leitrim referee, Frank Flynn, sounded the final whistle, there wasn’t a perished soul in the crowd of about 500 who could question the justice of the outcome.
It is only pre-season and last Sunday’s blast of dry polar winds did remind everyone that this is far from summer football, but make no mistake about it, the match did lay down some very worrying markers for Galway following a couple of victories over below par third level college teams.
Galway did start the game quite positively, leading by four points at the end of a first quarter when they missed as much more, but when Sligo stepped up the tempo of the game in the 10 minutes before half-time, the maroon resistance crumbled with frightening rapidity.
Some of the statistics of the match make for grim perusal. Over the course of the hour, Galway only scored two points from play and they went through a 52 minute period of the match, without raising a white flag – admittedly a late rally did bring them close to a draw but that would have been very rough justice on Sligo.
Sligo were backable at 9/4 coming into this match, the odds being stretched with the ‘missing list’ on Kevin Walsh’s team sheet – Adrian Marren, Stephen Coen, Tony Taylor, Ross Donovan, David Kelly, David Maye, Johnny Davey and Eamon O’Hara, were all marked absent for a variety of reasons.
Walsh has his Sligo side well schooled in the high intensity, close quarters type of football, and the harder Galway tried to go through the short game channels, the more the home side bottled them up.
Galway badly needed to find some variety in their attacking strategy and maybe there is a lot to be said for the traditional Meath style of giving long, quick ball to a full forward line with a big target man on the edge of the square – given Paul Conroy’s prowess close to goal last season, maybe it is time to ‘settle’ on a few basics.
Defensively, Galway were reasonably solid with Gary Sice at centre back probably their best player – he was one of the few men in maroon to deliver decent long ball deep into the attacking zone – while Finian Hanley, Conor Costello and Gary O’Donnell also kept things tight.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Date Published: 23-Jan-2013
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