Archive News
Extra time joy for Cortoon
Date Published: 17-Dec-2009
It may have taken two hours and twenty minutes to sort out, but Cortoon Shamrocks are celebrating their first ever trophy at senior football level when they deservedly foiled Tuam Stars’ ambitions of another trophy in 2009.
For years Cortoon were meandering through the senior and intermediate ranks but their major breakthrough came last year when they reached the county football championship final.
While they failed to realise their potential in that match, they got some compensation on Sunday in Tuam Stadium when they captured this year’s senior league title with some extra time excellence.
Having relinquished a five point lead in normal time, they made no mistake in 20 minutes of extra time and limited Tuam Stars to just one score – a goal – during that period. However, at that stage, Cortoon had done sufficient amount of damage to ensure victory with the first period of extra time proving crucial when they scored four points without reply.
Last week the two sides drew in a tight encounter when Cortoon came from three points behind to level the match and force a replay. On this occasion, the tables were turned and it required Tuam Stars to nab a goal in injury time from Tony Costello to force the game into extra time. But they just ran out of ideas and stamina during that period.
It was an occasion when the veteran of many county campaigns really shone through. Wing forward Derek Savage was the inspiration behind this Cortoon victory and it was also an occasion when the club’s big guns did not let the side down.
David Warde, Michael Martin, Fergal Heverin and David Finnegan were also outstanding for Cortoon who should have really wrapped up this title in normal time.
But a bit of complacency on their part towards the end of normal time when they were five points ahead accounted for Cortoon having to endure the trauma of extra time at a bitingly cold venue which was attended by a disappointing crowd of around 500.
Having accumulated what looked like an unassailable lead, they probably put Ja Fallon’s point down to a consolation score and had the same reaction when Darren Kelly pointed from play as the game was in injury time.
Then, in one of the best moves seen this year in club football, Jamie Murphy combined with the on-running Gary O’Donnell who then provided Tony Costello with the goal chance and he made no mistake in crashing the ball to the back of the net. A dream goal if there was ever one.
It should have been a tonic goal and one that provided Tuam Stars with a lifeline but, unfortunately for them, it was an opportunity the failed to grasp as they were totally outplayed in the two periods of extra time.
For the full match report see page 53 of this week’s Connacht Tribune
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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