Archive News
Champs Killererin renew rivalry with city men
Date Published: {J}
CIARAN TIERNEY
COUNTY champions Killererin will have to see off the challenge of 2005 title holders Salthill-Knocknacarra in a repeat of last year’s tussle at the same stage after the sides were drawn together in the second round of the senior football championship on Sunday evening.
Padraic Joyce, Nicky Joyce, and company overcame the city side by 0-16 to 1-11 in the same round last year, on their way to winning their third title in seven years – and it was Nicky who rescued their cause in a stirring first round fight-back against another city club, St Michael’s, last month.
The North Galway club, which never knows when it’s beaten, needed a dollop of good fortune, in the form of three controversial refereeing decisions, to see off a St Michael’s side who suffered further heartbreak when St James’ condemned them to the relegation series at the weekend.
Killererin will need to show an improvement if they are to overcome a Salthill side who, it could be argued, have underachieved since winning the All-Ireland title in 2006. Salthill also suffered a bit of a scare in the first round when they had just two points to spare over Cortoon Shamrocks.
The tie of the round is also a repeat of the memorable 2004 county final at Pearse Stadium when Padraic Joyce staged a remarkable recovery from injury to take his place in the Killererin team who registered a 1-10 to 0-10 victory over the seasiders. These teams have built up quite a rivalry over the past decade.
Newcomers St James’, who reached February’s All-Ireland Intermediate final after winning the Galway title last October, will now take on Moycullen in the last 16 after their comfortable victory in the city derby last Saturday.
St James’ had five points to spare over St Michael’s in the back door round at Pearse Stadium, a victory which guarantees them senior football for next season and a welcome turnaround after their opening day defeat to Claregalway.
This is St James’ first season in the senior ranks and, after showing some nerves against Claregalway, they will now feel they have nothing to lose with the threat of demotion removed. St Michael’s now have to take on Mountbellew-Moylough in a relegation semi-final.
For their part, Claregalway will take on a NUI Galway side who only enter the championship at this stage, while Bearna have been left with a tough task after drawing 13 times champions Corofin, who knocked them out at the semi-final stage last year (0-11 to 0-9).
Gary Sice and Damien Burke were the stars for Corofin in their 2-11 to 1-6 victory over Micheal Breathnach in the first round last month and they will be keen to regain the county crown after winning three titles in a row between 2006 and 2009. But they will take nothing for granted against a side who pushed them all the way last year.
Late goals from Ray Conneely and Kieran Hanley gave Bearna a hard-earned 2-10 to 0-11 victory over Leitir Mor, after the city side found themselves five points down after just seven minutes of action, and they should have revenge on their minds when the second round fixtures take place on the weekend of July 2-3.
Cortoon, who had six points to spare over Caltra in the qualifiers on Sunday, will take on Micheal Breathnach. The Connemara men recovered from their heavy first round loss to Corofin to overcome Mountbellew-Moylough by two points at the weekend.
There are two North Galway ‘derbies’ in the second round, with Kilkerrin-Clonberne set to face Tuam Stars after overcoming Killanin in their back door tie (1-11 to 0-11).
It’s surely the draw which neither team wanted, as they have already faced each other in the first round, when Tuam were victorious on a 3-14 to 1-8 scoreline. This fixture may yet lead to some ‘tweaking’ with the format of the senior championship, as it surely unfair on teams to meet again in the second round if they already faced each other first time out.
Milltown, victors over Leitir Mor in the first round, will do battle with Caherlistrane. Both of these sides won their first round ties, as Caherlistrane had three points to spare over a Caltra side who now face the relegation dog-fight after their defeat to Cortoon in the qualifiers.
In the remaining fixture, Annaghdown will take on An Cheathru Rua. Annaghdown needed three goals to see off Tuam in a bizarre, error-ridden first round tie, in which the sides managed to register 28 wides between them.
An Cheathru Rua will start as favourites after hitting an impressive 1-17 in another bizarre game against Killanin, in which the Corribsiders managed to score five goals but still lose (they hit 5-2 over the hour). Cillin De Paor was hugely impressive for An Cheathru Rua in that tie, scoring 1-5.
Second round draw: Moycullen v St James’, Micheal Breathnach v Cortoon Shamrocks, Bearna v Corofin, Salthill-Knocknacarra v Killererin, Milltown v Caherlistrane, Claregalway v NUI Galway, Kilkerrin-Clonberne v Tuam Stars, Annaghdown v An Cheathru Rua.
Relegation draw: Play-off: Caltra v Leitir Mor; semi-finals: Mountbellew-Moylough v St Michael’s, Caltra or Leitir Mor v Killanin.
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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