CLCG Fochumann An Phaire ONWARDS & UPWARDS, THAT’S THE REALITY he first time | came across a 45 in Gaelic Football was 1971. I was visiting relations in Kilmeena when a cousin of mine brought me to the pitch as he was playing for Kilmeena against Parke in a West Mayo |unior B Championship match. When | arrived there | discovered that Parke had only 12 players so | was summoned to play. Someone of the Parke players gave mea spare pair of boots that were 2 sizes too big and a pair of togs that were down to my knees. | was told I was playing in goal. We lost 12-10 to 1 point - a 45 point defeat. | won't name any of the team but we didn’t feature in the knock-out stages of the Championship. | played for the first team for the first time in 1973 in Walter Durcan's field against Breaffy. Gerry Carney told me just before the game | was starting in goal because regular goalkeeper Michael McNeela was injured. | thought of the “Kilmeena massacre” but Mick Connor who was playing comer back just told me to concentrate on the ball and he would take care of any forwards that were trying to come in on top of me. We won by 4 points and | only let in one goal. | didn’t appreciate its significance at the time but it was the first time that we beat Breaffy since the club was formed, but | could see what it meant to players like Frank Fahy, Padraic Dunne, Christy Murphy, Jimmy Lawless and Bernie McHale. A lot of young players were being introduced Tommy ( Boyle FM to the team around that time like Tom McHale, Frank McHale, jimmy Flynn, Frank Duffy, Cyril Moran and John Gibbons and although we failed to reach the semi finals of the West Mayo Championship in ‘73 or 74 the team was young and gaining experience. We were very unlucky in 1974 as we lost by one point to Westport in a play-off to qualify for the West Mayo semi-final and we also missed a penalty in that match. In 1975 we had a very good under 21 team and lost the West Mayo A final to Westport by one point in a match we should have won. We were leading by 5 points with 5 minutes to go and they got 2 goals and robbed us. Even though it's 35 years ago | am reminded about it almost once a week as a work colleague of mine, Aiden Walsh, scored one of the goals. We reached the West Junior final in 1975 also and lost this to Ballintubber by 2-10 to 1-9. It was a terrific game - not much consolation when we lost. Even though we lost that final we had a very young team with 11 of that team that played in the West Final under 21 1976 was always going to be the year that we felt that we could make the breakthrough but with the arrival of Brian McDonald as Manager the expectation went through theThe 1976 Park roof. Getting him as Manager was a big coup at the time as he was an All-Ireland winner with Dublin in 1963 and had won County Senior medals with Castlebar. However, when we started training we received a real culture shock as we had never experienced this type of physical training before, with some of the Sunday morning sessions being particularly savage. We were playing with great confidence and sailed into the West Mayo semi-finals where we played Breaffy in the semi final in McHale Park, winning by 12 points to 6 points. The West Final was against Castlebar in McHale Park Castlebar had gone through the qualifiers and semi-final very impressively and had a lot of good young players like Martin Walsh, Tom Blake, Padraic Jordan and experienced players like ex-Mayo player Joe Langan (R.|.P.) and Tom Grier. There was a lot of talk and banter in the build up to the match especially Junior Pa County Final Winners as Brian McDonald was a former player. We went in at ha time 6 points down and looked beaten. We were expectir a rollicking but instead he just made a few switches ar told us we were doing fine. We were level in 15 minutes b Castlebar then got a goal to really rock us but we managed fight back and force a draw deep in injury time, mainly than to Jimmy Flynn who scored 8 points that day. We knew we were lucky to get a draw and were determin to make sure that we won the replay. Brian McDonald ma numerous positional changes. | was given the job of markit Joe Langan who was playing midfield with Lofty Walsh, wi Cyril Moran marking Lofty. However, Joe Langan want to mark Cyril, so it was like musical chairs for the first t minutes. We started well and were 7 points up at half tin 1991 Jersey Presentation1996 The Park U 12 Team ‘We went in at half time cock-a-hoop expecting to be praised. Instead Brian McDonald went through us making sure that \we didn’t think that the match was won, Mitchel’s came at us for the first ten minutes but Tom McHale sent a 50 yard free straight to the net. Game over. At last we had won a West Mayo title. We would have settled for that for the year but not Brian McDonald. We were very quickly brought down to earth on the next night at training and were told in no uncertain terms that nothing less than a County Title would be accepted. We beat Claremorris by 8 points in the County semi-final in probably our best performance of the year to set Up a county final with Lahardane. It was first County Final for both teams and a local derby. We were hot favourites which probably didn’t suit us as we were a young team. Michael Kerins and myself were working in Casey's Garage at the time and we were working with Jimmy McGreevy (an uncle of Chris and Sean Kerins) who was playing for Lahardane. He was playing midfield with Tommy Leonard and | ended up marking him in the final. We started well and were well on top but missed a lot of chances. We went in at half time 4 points up. Michael O'Boyle scored a {goal for us in the first half. We just couldn't put them away and when they scored a goal 5 minutes from time it made it a very nervous last few minutes and they could have snatched it in the last minutes had it not been for a great interception from Harry Flynn. We won by 2 points. The celebrations went on for months and certainly didn’t help the following year where we were hoping to be serious contenders for the Intermediate Championship. We never reached the heights and were beaten in the first round by Ballinrobe. We also lost by 3 points to Kiltimagh in 1978 in the first round of the championship. We won our first championship match in Intermediate in 1979 when we beat Swinford with jimmy Carney scoring 3 goals. We beat Kilmeena by 5 points in the quarter final but we were well beaten by Ballinrobe in the semi-final who went on to win the final 1980 was a disappointing year losing to Glencorrib in the first round and after 4 years relegated back to Junior. They say that sometimes you have to go back to go forward and that certainly was the case with that team. The make-up of the team was also evolving with players like Walter Moran, Richie McHale becoming very influential and Pat Flannery now playing midfield and a new goalkeeper in Michael Flynn (R.L.P.) and my own brother John coming into the team. Winning the Junior in 1981 wasn't as big a deal as 1976 but it was just a difficult, as it was seen as a means back to Intermediate. We beat a good Achill tam in the West final and beat Swinford in the semi-final and Ballycastle in the final. In 1982 we felt that we had a real chance of winning the Intermediate. We beat Mayo Gaels in the first round and were drawn against Tourmakeady in the semi-final. We beat them by 13 points in a league game a few weeks before we met them in the championship which was the worst thing that could have happened us, and as has happened to so many other teams in the past we lost by 2 points. Our cause wasn’t helped by a knee injury to our star man Cyril Moran the night before the match and a hip injury to my brother John during the match. We beat Ballintubber in the Kelly Cup Final but it was consolation only for not winning the championship, as Tourmakeady went on to beat Burrishoole in the final. 1983 came and we felt as it was now or never as we were six years trying to win the Intermediate Championship, and a few players were starting to get on a bit. Tom Lawless, Christy Murphy and Gerry Carey had us it and the panel had received a boost by the emergence of Padraic Reilly and john Lawless. We beat Kilmovee in the 1st round of the championship 4-15 to 4 points and were drawn against Burrishoole in the Quarter Final. They were the beaten finalists from the previous year and always difficult opponents. They say you need luck to win a championship and we certainly had it that day. We dug out2.3 points win, 1-9 to 1-6 with Burrishoole kicking numerous wides and also missing a penalty, with Frank McHale getting the vital goal near the end. We beat Carramore in the semi-final 2-10 to 1-6 despite being behind by 4 points at half-time to set up a final with Swinford. It took us 2 games to beat them with us maybe lucky to get a draw the first day. However, the 2nd day there was no doubt = Parke winning by 1-9 to 2 points - the highlight being a magnificent defence performance - some great points by Joe Flynn and a soccer style volleyed goal by my brother john. We lost to Belmullet in the league final and lost to Hollymount in the super league semifinal, both games by 1 point. We were missing Jimmy Flynn and Ritchie McHale for the Hollymount game and they were a huge loss. Jimmy Flynn would get ‘on any senior team in Mayo for 10 years 1975 to 1985 and Ritchie McHale was a superb midfielder. We probably needed to win the Intermediate a couple of years sooner to make a real impact at senior level, even though we reached the quarter final in 1986 before losing narrowly to Davitt. It was a great time to be playing with Parke and there was a great comradeship among the players that remains to this day. One of the things that I looked forward to after matches was meeting some of the great characters from the parish and | remember going into Healy’s Hotel in Pontoon after beating Ballycastle in the County Junior Final and meeting ‘Simon Gibbons. He congratulated me and a few more players and remarked that we were a little bit too “scientific” for Ballycastle. | never hear the phrase used before or since in football terms. ‘The Bord na nOg has played a huge role in the development and success of the club in the last 40 years. The people that served as officers and on committees and the people that gave their time as managers and selectors make sure that the Bord na nOg run smoothly and the conveyer belt of talent that the club needs to survive continues to come through. It also helps to put players in the shop window so to speak to get into inter-county squads at u 16 or minor or development squads at under 15. Parke had a golden era in Bord na nOg from 1990 to 2003 winning 12 West Mayo titles including a West Mayo under 14 A title - a team that was narrowly beaten by Claremorris in the B semi final in controversial circumstances. They also won 3 County under 168 titles and 1 minor B title in this period of time, While the club has experienced a bit of a drought in winning championships since 2003 | feel that a new golden era is about to begin based on last years and this year’s under 10 panels which had such huge success winning the Community ‘Games in 2009 and this year’s under 15 team winning the Division 3 league. My managerial career with Parke started in 1993 and continued until 2008. During this time | managed every age group including every grade of team from under 10 to Intermediate. When you are managing a team you are only as good as the people that are with you and | was lucky that | had good people with me during those years. Winning the ‘County under 16 B in 2000 and the Minor B in 2001 were the highlights for me at underage level. However, managing Parke at Intermediate level for 4 years was @ great honour. We reached the quarter finals in 2004 and 2005 losing to Breaffy and Ballinrobe respectively. We won the Kelly cup in 2005 beating Breaffy in the final but the rollercoaster ride to the Intermediate final in 2006 was the highlight. After losing at home to Ballintubber in the first game we beat Bonniconlon away, Davitts away, coming from. 7 points down with 8 minutes to go, scoring 3 goals in the last 8 minutes, a Gary Costello penalty, a Simon Cloherty free and Pat Dunne to win by 1 point. Pat Dunne scored an injury time goal to beat Kilmeena ig the quarter final. Eoin Camey scored a magnificent solo goal against Ballyhauni the semi-final. To come so close in the final and to lose by a point was heartbreaking. We gave Tourmakeady a seven point start in the first ten minutes and for the next 50 minutes | think we played as well as that team ever played and a few bad wides cost us the match. But Tourmakeady proved that year what a good team they were becoming the only team from Mayo then and since to win the Connaught Intermediate Championship. The margin between winning and losing is small as we found out in 2008. With 10 minutes to go in a group championship match away to Kilcommon we were leading and top of the group. We subsequently lost the match and lost narrowly to Kilmeena in the play off. But here ‘we are 2 years later Mayo Champions and Connaught Club Champions with the first half performance against Eslin as one of the best performances ever by a Parke team. As | said previously and | believe it’s worth repeating, they say sometimes that you have to go back to go forward so maybe it wasn’t the worst thing in the world to go down to Junior for the last two years. With the best squad of players the club has ever had, | hope that they don’t rest on their laurels, but now push on and try to win the Intermediate Championship which they are definitely capable of doing soon. When I started managing teams | had a black head of hair but when I finished I had a grey one. For some strange reason this hasn’t happened to the present Manager, Frank McHale. He gets a few grey ribs from time to time and they seem to disappear again. | can’t figure it out. It must be the great performances the team are putting in for him!