The Mon versus Críost Rí — ‘It was the biggest game a lot of us ever played in’

Four decades ago, the Harty final was a Cork city affair: North Monastery vs Coláiste Chríost Rí. When one of those Críost Rí players says now it was the talk of the city, he’s not exaggerating. Horizons were more limited, which sharpened the focus on what was important.

And the Harty was always significant. Paddy Connery can recall the impression made by the Mon’s 1970 win on a seven-year-old. That team featured Donal O’Grady, who coached the 1981 side with Murt Murphy, stationing Connery in the full-back line.

“Coming up through the primary we had some success with Brother Burke and Jim Turner, who passed away last year,” says Connery now.

“There was always a good mix of lads like John Drinan from Carrigaline, Teddy (McCarthy) coming up from Glanmire, along with lads from Na Piarsaigh and Glen Rovers.

“Once you got to third year, the Harty was the goal if you were interested in hurling. That was your aim.”

The dynamic was different across the river in Turners Cross.

“We were always a football school,” says Tony Leahy, who was Coláiste Chríost Rí’s midfielder in 1981. “That year we were going for four Corn Uí Mhuirí titles in a row, and I’d have gotten the four medals, but Ballyvourney beat us in the semi-final in 1981.

“We’d won an U15½ hurling title a couple of years before, though, and most of the Harty team came through from that. And we beat the Mon to win that title, so we’d have been confident.

“No-one expected us to get to the Harty final but we beat Flannan’s thanks to a soft enough goal, and the whole thing snowballed.”

The final was fixed for Páirc Uí Chaoimh. At a time of relatively few distractions, it became a “huge deal”, recalls Críost Rí ‘keeper Diarmuid Cotter.

The Mon were like Real Madrid and we were the upstarts. We’d only won the Harty once before, in 1968 when our trainer, Jim Cremin, was the goalkeeper on the team. Críost Rí was a football school, really.

“But the final was the talk of the city. It was northside-southside, there were press photographers at training, interviews... I turned 17 before the game. It was a big deal to a kid that age.

“The attendance on the day was given as 8,000, but my memory is that the old covered stand was full, so there could have been more there than that.

“Being honest, it was the biggest game a lot of us ever played in.”

The fact that it was in a stadium rather than Buttevant or Emly, more traditional venues, “could have been” an issue, says Mon joint-manager Murt Murphy: “We thought about that a lot at the time, wondering would we get permission to train there ahead of the game.

“In the end, we decided not to because we felt it would be making the field an issue, which might affect the players. It was an ordinary field. We dealt with the issue of the pitch by ignoring it.”

Corner-back Connery says Murphy and O’Grady were “streets ahead” as managers: “They had us watching videos of opponents then: we saw St Colman’s on video before playing the semi-final, which was a big advantage.

“They also had us playing to a pattern. We had an idea of where to deliver the ball when we had it, which was very different at the time.

“In 1980, they’d had huge talent on the Mon Harty team — Jim Murray, Paul O’Connor, Tomás Mulcahy, Tony O’Sullivan, Martin Lyons — it was a savage team but Murty and Donal polished that talent.

“We didn’t have the same level of talent, but we had some bite to us. And it was the school’s third Harty final in a row, so a good few of the players had experience of finals.”

Their opponents were equally unlikely to freeze. It was Leahy’s fourth Munster senior colleges final in a row, as noted: “We were used to playing in finals thanks to the Corn Uí Mhuirí, so for us, it was just another game.

“It was a big occasion and maybe a few fellas struggled with that, but most of the lads were used to it.”

The game itself hinged on a couple of decisive events. Take the Mon’s two early goals from captain John Drinan.

“After 40 years, I can set the record straight,” laughs Cotter.

“The ball took a deflection off Paul O’Leary’s hurley on the way in for the first goal.

“I didn’t realise at the time that people thought I made a mistake, but after the match, I heard people mentioning the goalkeeper and I wondered what they meant.

“He (Drinan) pulled on the ball and I remember thinking as he did so, ‘this is great, an easy ball first thing’, but it clipped off Paul’s hurley and shot to the other side of the goal.

“I got over to the ball but it was over the line. Goal. And to this day I can remember when that happened, you couldn’t hear anything. No noise.

“And then a second later, the place — or half the place — went wild. There was that slight delayed reaction as the Mon supporters realised it was a goal.”

Drinan’s second goal was another blow.

“The match report said he used his hand for the other goal,” says Cotter.

“I’d swear to this day he used his hurley.

“It was a brilliant goal, in fairness — the ball came in high and I felt myself and Denis O’Brien had it covered, but he got a touch to it.”

It was no accident. Murt Murphy had done “a lot of work with John on flicking high balls with one hand.

“He was playing full-forward but he wasn’t that big so we worked specifically on that, getting a touch on the dropping ball.

“Training teams, you’d do a lot of work which reaps no reward, but he got the perfect ball that day and got the flick on it. The goalkeeper had no chance.”

Another turning point came with the dismissal of Leahy along with Robert Allen of the Mon midway through the second half. Allen was always a goal threat for the Mon, but Leahy was the southside school’s key player.

“The Barrs were the underage team of the time,” says Cotter.

“I was playing for Blackrock and we were good enough to get to city finals, but the Barrs always beat us.

“And Tony was the main man. He was a man-child, really. One of the years I was in the school, they won all the football competitions they entered and he was on every one of the teams.

“He was amazing. An unbelievable player.”

The sending-off wasn’t something Leahy dwelt on, then or now: “Who dwells on anything at 17 or 18 years of age? I was in with the Cork minor footballers at the time and was called into the minor hurling trials then as well.

What I remember more clearly is I was on the Barrs senior football panel, and we won the All-Ireland club final that year. I remember my mother saying to me, ‘you’re not going to that game in Dublin, your Leaving Cert is starting the following Wednesday’.

“It was a big thing at the time, being sent off, but I was on so many teams that I probably had another couple of games the following weekend, and I moved on quickly enough.

“It was the only time I was ever sent off, though.”

“Tony was the danger man,” Connery says.

“He was big and could hurl, he was very athletic, and the sending-off had a big bearing on the game.

“Robert was a cracking goal poacher and a loss to us, but Leahy was probably their best hurler. We definitely came into it more after he went off.”

Cotter recalls his side being in the hunt until the end, when a “soft enough point” put the Mon two up. Connery acknowledges that Críost Rí could have snatched it: “Fergie Golden, who was a very good forward, went for goal from an impossible angle late on — if that had gone in they’d have won, but we hung on.”

It ended 2-6 to 1-7. Murphy recalls the character of the northside team.

“There was great cutting in them. Frank Higgins at centre-back, for instance, wasn’t a stylish hurler but by God, he was something else.

“He stood in front of his goal all that day and was a tower of strength: it was like tennis, every ball that came down to him, he flaked it back upfield.

“One of the other teachers came to see the team at the start of the year in a game, and he said they were ‘gutsy’. That’s what they were.”

For his part, Diarmuid Cotter didn’t continue as a goalkeeper.

“I was a good shot-stopper but I was too nervous, really, to be a good ‘keeper.

“That sense of being responsible for the team losing if you made a mistake — I ended up playing out the field.”

Ironically, he only ended up in goal that day because his predecessor got a better offer.

“Kieran O’Regan went on to play for Brighton and ended up winning caps with the Republic of Ireland, but before that, he was in goal for the Críost Rí Harty team.

“He was there when we beat Flannan’s in the Harty quarter-final but then he left and I was promoted from sub keeper.”

All concerned are warm in their praise for Jim Cremin, the Críost Rí trainer who passed away recently.

“He was a huge part of it,” says Cotter.

“I had great time for him. He was the ‘keeper on the 1967 Harty team that won it for Críost Rí, and he was just a total gentleman, a great guy.

“I’m out of Cork over 30 years but that Cork thing never leaves you, that love of hurling. Jim Cremin had that love of hurling and he gave that to us.”

“Jim was a very noble, very honourable person,” says Murphy.

“We wouldn’t have had much interaction during that game but he was always good if you were organising matches and so on, very easy to deal with.”

There was a final twist to the day itself. When the Mon players came out of the dressing rooms, management had an idea.

“Murty and Donal said we’d walk back to the school after the game,” says Connery. “I thought they were mad. I was half-shattered.” (“That must have been Donal’s idea,” says Murphy now.) “But it turned out to be a great move,” says Connery.

We walked back up with the supporters who were still around the Páirc, and it was fantastic to head back together, back up through the city to the bonfires burning by the Lodge in the Mon.

“It was a long stroll, but it was a great experience.”

Four decades on, the day still glows for the winners.

“Ah, it was a highlight. Absolutely,” says Connery.

“My dad is dead 30 years but my mother said he was so proud that I was on the team — not that he would have said so, it wasn’t his style — but he got a great kick out of it.

“If you notice, people never refer to ‘the senior hurling team’ in the Mon — or in any other school, I’d say. It’s always the Harty team.”