Tell me about your first steps in football…
I played for Sheriff United between the ages of 10-15. At the age of 16 I played for the Shamrock Rovers youth team before finishing my schoolboys’ days at Stella Marris.
Who were your idols growing up?
John Giles, Liam Touhy, my brother Mick and Pat Courtney who played for Shamrock Rovers at the time.
How did you start playing in the League of Ireland?
I was an avid follower of the league. Every week I’d be watching either Shamrock Rovers or Shelbourne depending on who was at home. I had played for the B team at Rovers. I was really enjoying my time with Stella Marris so I wanted to finish my time there before moving to a club. Synan Braddish was there too and he went to Dundalk but I stayed on for another year before joining Jim McLaughlin’s team. At that stage I was a flying outside left!!!
What was your first impressions of Dundalk FC?
My first impression was that of being offered a cup of Mickey Fox’s pink tea! He told me that if I drank plenty of his pink tea I would last a long time at Dundalk Football Club. I did and I did!!! Mickey Fox inviting me into his room for tea and a marieta biscuit was like St Peter inviting me into heaven. I loved Mickey. He truly epitomised Dundalk FC.
You made your debut in the 1977/78 season…
Yes I remember it was a match against Thurles Town. Then I decided that I was too big for my boots! I thought I was bulletproof and that I should be in the team all of the time. I had a row with Jim McLaughlin and went off to America for four months. However, I came to my senses and returned to Dundalk for the start of the next season. From that point onwards I was part of the 1st team.
And what a great team to be apart of and a great season as we won the Double…
It was a fantastic side. There was a lot of new faces. I was playing alongside another one of my idols in Tommy McConville. We had the artistic flair of Leo “Pop” Flanagan and the wonderful abrasive defensive quality of Dermot Keely. Put a brash young Martin Lawlor in there too and you have a great team! It’s also hard to look back at that time without thinking of a few players who are no longer with us. We’ve lost Brian McConville, Seanie and Liam. I remember Liam Devine used to come to the games after receiving his treatment. It used to galvanise us to perform at a very high level.
What do you remember about the Linfield game?
It’s bizarre. While recognising the seriousness of the situation, a lot of it was funny. There was some real keystone cops stuff going on. But for people to use a football match as a conduit to violence is terrible.
You played against Celtic later in the competition and your brother scored also…
The Celtic game in Parkhead was phenomenal. We could have beaten them in Parkhead because we created a lot of other chances. We gave them a huge fright. We were a little bit naive in the first fifteen minutes and maybe had a little bit of a lack of belief. But we came into it and got a great result. We had a totally different attitude in the 2ndleg in Oriel Park. Our frame of mind changed completely. We went into it in a very attacking manner and we very nearly got our just rewards. Such a pity as we would have got Real Madrid in the next round!
Much like 1988, there was a lot of big personalities in the dressing room then. Was it difficult for you at a young age?
Well you were required to operate at a very high level of service. We had very high standards. That atmosphere was created from within the team itself and the type of people we were. Things have changed so much now. Society has changed and the game has changed. A lot of those changes just don’t fit in with the competitive spirit. We would be absolutely devastated if we lost and would even be very upset if we drew. A bad result would affect our lives. We wouldn’t be smiling or giving the opposition players high-fives or hugs. There would be players who if things went wrong you wouldn’t be able to get them out of the dressing room or changed out of their kit until the post-mortem was complete. It was all about the passion we had for the jersey we were wearing. We absolutely knew that when we put on the Dundalk shirt we were representing a town and a lot of very passionate football supporters. It was a serious business and we showed a lot of pride in our performances.
You won another league in 1982 and a cup in 1981 under Jim McLaughlin. Was it a painful experience to see that team break up?
Anytime a great side reaches such high levels and then breaks up is painful. You lose familiarity with team-mates. You would be looking for the familiar faces in the dressing room and they would be fewer and fewer. The new lads that came in wouldn’t have seen what the Dundalk fans wanted or appreciated. I would sit under the number three hook in the dressing room and I found it difficult to reconstitute myself to all the changes. We had a few changes of managers and the fans know that some of the players that came in and put on the jersey just were not at the races.
And then Turlough O’Connor arrived.
Yes thank God another wonderful man came into the club in Turlough. He was great at identifying the personality traits in players that he needed to put together a successful team. Under Turlough you were allowed to go out and do your stuff on the pitch. There was not a great emphasis on tactics or big complicated team talks. If you wanted to be a better player it was up to you to do that yourself at training.
How would you try to improve?
I would make sure I would know everything about every winger in the league. I would go through all the teams and find out who my possible opponents would be. I would know if they were small, tall, fat, skinny, quick, slow, tough, weak, injury prone and everything else…This would make me analyse myself more also. I reckon that process helped me extend my career by many years.
Probably a bit different to today’s player!
Things have certainly changed. But I had a lot of disappointments in my career also. I have five runner-up medals…and I often think about what could have been. If only we got one or two more points and how we if he had done something differently. But it is different from today. Society has changed. It’s not the players fault. I think for one thing FIFA have destroyed some of the competitive elements of the game. I’m not saying they shouldn’t stop dirty tackles but this idea of lining up before the match and shaking hands with your opponents before you go into combat is ridiculous.
For a player like yourself, watching players dive must drive you mad…
It’s a joke. When we played you wouldn’t dream of showing that your opponent had hurt you. If you got hit you would get up as quickly as you could and got on with it. You had to make sure you didn’t look weak in the eyes of your opponent. Then you could get to half-time or full-time and scream like a baby with the pain!
Did the defence you played with in the 1988 team compare to the McLaughlin era?
Yes. There was a great honesty about our defence in 1987/88. We all had a great passion about what we were trying to do like we did back in 1979. That passion was exemplified in their performances. I mean I would travel back to Dublin with Alan O’Neill. He might have tipped the ball over the bar and got a great round of applause from the crowd. But he would be in the car saying how annoyed he was with himself that he didn’t hang on to it. Similarly, if John Cleary didn’t win all his headers he’d be annoyed. If Joey Malone didn’t sweep the ball up like Franz Beckenbaur then he’d be distraught. If Gino Lawless only made 20 tackles in match instead of 25 he’d be upset. It was the same myself. If I’d fail to prevent a cross into the box i’d be apologising afterwards to Alan…he’d probably be saying “Sure I just picked that ball out of the air!”.
Did you all have to work hard to get that defensive understanding?
Yes. It was not just about the passion. It’s as I explain it to kids that I would train: “Don’t aim for success. Let success be a by-product of your training regime and performances”.
What are your memories of the 1988 season?
It’s hard having been at Dundalk for 18 years to remember specifics. I remember the FAI Cup final very well. Turlough pulled off a tactical masterstroke that day. People just saw us as a 4-4-2 team but that day Turlough changed us to a 3-5-2 with myself and Gino on the wings with Johner, Joey and Harry in the centre. We knew that if we got a goal we could deal with anything else. It was our trademark so to speak. We had some great strikers at the club throughout my time there: Mick Fairclough, the Dundalk Hawk Dessie and big Hilda. We used to allow the other team to take the initiative and let them come at us. You could almost see them thinking that they were on a winner but we’d be smoking cigars at the back knowing that we could hold out. Then we would hit them. We would often win games 1-0 or 2-0 and leave the other team scratching their heads as they thought they had the better of us.
You captained the side to the 1991 League winning success. A few weeks later you decided to leave. What was your reasoning for your departure?
Yes we won the league down in Cork. That was my fourth league winning medal. I was a long time at the club and I needed a fresh challenge. Also I think the best time to leave is when you are at the pinnacle rather than when things are going wrong. At the time Shamrock Rovers were on the verge of a new era. My father and brother had played for Rovers so I had an affection for them. I thought it would be a great challenge to go back to Rovers and try to bring them forward.
You came back the following season so it obviously did not work out that way…
We had a very good team. We conceded only four goals in our first 14 games. But we had trouble scoring goals so we didn’t take off like we should have done. Noel King was sacked early on and Ray Treacy came in. Soon he got rid of 14 players. So it just didn’t happen and I decided to take up an offer to come back to Dundalk.
And you ended up with another league title in 1995!
That squad was a great bunch of lads. They were all lovely people and there was a great camaraderie in the team. We were always wrote off but we deservedly won the league at the end. And when you analyse that team doesn’t it look familiar? A number of old heads like Anto Whelan, my good friend John Coady, James Coll…players that had been around the block and then a number of flair players. That year Dermot preferred John Coady a lot of the time to myself but it was still a great time. I was very proud to have that fifth league medal. That was the end of my time at the club. Dermot decided that he needed to bring in new blood and I moved on.
You continued to play for a few more years after that…
Yes I remember winning a Coca Cola Cup medal playing with Robbie Lawlor for Crusaders against a great Linfield team at the Oval. And then as an oul fellah I won a league cup winners medal with Galway United down in Cork. That was a great feeling to finish on a high.
