Tag Archives: Éire Óg Ennis

Much of my life is in Kerry now and nearly every day it involves a drive into Kerins O’Rahilly’s country — the stronghold and foundation stone of the club on Strand Road. Indeed, so central to the Kerins O’Rahilly story is the place that the club is more often than not referred to as Strand Road. And, Strand Road is littered with football stories about great men who wore the club colors and went as high as any footballer could go — Dan Spring, Paddy Kennedy Jas Murphy and John Dowling, who were All-Ireland winning captains who played for the club; there isn’t enough room for the rest of the All-Ireland winners. We’ll mention four though: David Moran, Tommy Walsh, Jack Savage and Barry John Keane. We mention them because this quartet will be playing on Sunday, with each one of them being a Strand Road All-Ireland alumnus and part of the tradition of putting Sam Maguire up on the …

AFTER spending last year exclusively on the sidelines, Shane Daniels is back on the field of play and hoping to propel Éire Óg to a first ever Munster final. Before the Townies ended their 15 year wait to lift the Jack Daly Cup, they had consistently fallen at the quarter final stage with questions surrounding whether Éire Óg could win on the big day. They have certainly answered those questions as Daniels believes this team’s mentality is one of their biggest strengths. “Down the years we often lost tight games. Mentally this team is different. Their work ethic is huge and anything they are asked to do is never too much. We try and outwork every team so before a game we look at the opposition and try figure out how to do that.” The Éire Óg shotstopper feels that despite the step up in competition that comes when competing in the provincial series, the Townies are keeping the same …

Éire Óg manager Paul Madden insists that despite his side facing the arduous task of downing Kerry’s Kerins O’Rahillys in Austin Stack Park, the Townies feel they are capable of producing their best display of the year on Sunday. Despite Kerry and Cork dominating the Munster scene, Madden feels that last year’s campaign showed they were able to compete with any side in the province. His side have learned lessons from their defeat to St. Finbarr’s at this stage of the competition 11 months ago. “The big learning we took is that you cannot switch off. In the previous six or seven games before last year’s game (against St. Finbarr’s) when we conceded a free, the free taker would saunter out and we would reset. “The first free they got they took a short one and got a goal from it. The really good teams look up and see opportunities so that was definitely the major take from last year.” …

Éire Óg have won back to back senior football championship titles. Here is a selecton of images from the match shot by John Kelly

Eoin Brennan watched Éire Óg grind out victory over Ennistymon on a score of 0-9 to 0-6 to retain Jack Daly title ÉIRE Óg are unquestionably the Clare Senior Football kingpins after grinding out a determined victory over Ennistymon to retain their crown in Cusack Park on Sunday afternoon. Bouncing back from a heartbreaking late reverse to Ballyea in the hurling equivalent seven days previously, eight dual finalists maintained their unflinching focus to get over the line this time around as the Ennis side led from start to finish. It took patience and discipline to unlock an Ennistymon defensive door that had confounded four previous opponents as their swift counter-attacking style and unerring freetaking that included three marks, steered their side to victory. Central to that masterclass was captain Gavin Cooney who converted six placed balls to keep the scoreboard ticking over in what was far from a classic final. Two of those bookended a forgettable first half that saw …

HAVING emerged from completely contrasting starting blocks, Éire Óg and Ennistymon have also hand differing preparations in the lead-up to this first time final pairing. Of course, having underwhelmed in their relentless pursuit of the Jack Daly, the only surprise about Éire Óg’s 15 year breakthrough last November was that it hadn’t come sooner such was their potent line-up on paper. However, what hasn’t been a surprise is that the Townies are determined to make up for lost time by easing through this year’s championship to maintain their perfect nine match winning championship record. Even more impressively, they have almost seamlessly smoothed over the absence of Conall Ó hAiniféin, David Reidy, Nathan Murray, Eimhin Courtney and Dara Walsh, a remarklable feat in itself considering their contributions to that title-winning journey in 2021. Ennistymon meanwhile looked to have missed the boat in 2018 as for all their underage dominance over the past decade, the North Clare Magpies increasingly looked as if …

For any guest passing through the Falls Hotel reception last Thursday evening, they would have been forgiven for thinking that they were witnessing more of a casualty ward than a press night. After all, with injured players Cathal Malone (groin), Sean O’Driscoll (quad) and Kevin Hehir (knee) either limping or on crutches, it seemed as if the interview process was more akin to a therapy session. Even Club President Kieran Crowe is eagerly-awaiting his hip replacement operation only two days after the county final. The Galway native and Garda journeyman actually played for the Ennis Faughs in 1957 but was first stationed in Ennistymon in 1969 and aside from brief stints elsewhere has been a community fixture ever since and has been an integral part of the club’s development. “I just feel that if we could win one, we could stay at the top for a while.” began the 87-year-young president. “You look at the likes of Miltown and Kilmurry …

Although still a young man Eínne O’Connor has a huge amount of experience, experience he feels is valuable when looking to win a second Jack Daly. “Firstly I love playing football and I love playing for Éire Óg. We’ve had loads of tough defeats. I lost four quarter-finals in a row so that was extremely difficult to take. Last year I felt a lot of pressure to win because of those defeats and when we had huge success with U-21 which added more pressure especially when we weren’t transferring that to the Senior ranks.” Eínne spent four years in Athlone IT and played Sigerson for those four years. He is now at GMIT doing a Masters in Strength and Conditioning. So he is well placed to discuss what it takes to win. “Firstly you have to prepare right, both physically and mentally, eat right, sleep right. It’s all part of the modern game. We are drilled by Paul and the …