Plunkett and Fahy join forces again on new Offaly U-20 football management

A NEW Offaly U-20 football management will be put in place at the September meeting of the County Board.

Tullamore club man, Mark Plunkett and Galway's Gerry Fahy are joining forces once again on an Offaly management team. Plunkett will be the manager while Fahy, a vastly experienced football man with a chequered history in Offaly, is coming on board as the head coach. Another Tullamore club man, Benny O'Brien, a Roscommon native, and Rhode senior footballer Brian Darby will complete the management as selectors/coaches. Other back room personnel are also on board.

Mark Plunkett replaces another Tullamore man, Ken Furlong who stepped down after a two year term as manager this year. Furlong had replaced Offaly senior football joint manager, Declan Kelly who led Offaly to a sensational All-Ireland U-20 title in 2021.

Plunkett quickly put himself forward for the job once the vacancy arose, lining up his management team, and their nomination was rubber stamped by the football managements review committee on Monday evening. It has to be approved by a full board meeting.

It will be Gerry Fahy's second time to work with an Offaly football team. He was the Offaly senior football manager in 2004 but resigned in acrimonious circumstances after narrowly surviving two County Board votes. Fahy had been very popular with the players but there was friction with County Board officers during the year and after winning his two votes – the first one at a review meeting with all clubs entitled to representation and the second at a full County Board meeting -, he felt he did not have a strong enough mandate in place or sufficient support from senior officers to continue and opted out.

His departure was quickly followed by a very messy strike by players, who withdrew their services in protest, and only ended with a mediation agreement between them and the Board that was brokered by 1982 All-Ireland senior football winning manager, the late Eugene McGee. Some players had harboured hopes that this agreement would result in Gerry Fahy's return but these were scuppered when 1970s hero, Kevin Kilmurray was appointed.

The Eugene McGee agreement was a comprehensive document, outlining the procedures to be used for appointing county team managements and the entitlements of players. It was honoured for a few years before things changed on a drip feed basis but there has been no big stand-off between players and the County Board since then.

Mark Plunkett was one of Gerry Fahy's selectors in 2004, along with Offaly football folk hero, Matt Connor. Plunkett was also a selector under 1982 All-Ireland winning captain Richie Connor in 2009 but that also had an unseemly, abrupt end with the Walsh Island great resigning after a rebellion by players following a National Football League defeat by Roscommon.

The 2000s was a very ugly decade for Offaly football. Edenderry man Paul O'Kelly had been ousted as senior football manager after one year in 2003 while a Tullamore born man who played with Meath, Gerry Cooney, also walked the plank in mid season in 2012. There was a poisonous atmosphere for the guts of a decade and it took some years to heal.

Mark Plunkett was the manager of the Shamrocks team that was beaten by Tullamore in the 2007 Senior Football Championship final. He has been involved in various other teams and after returning from a few years in England after the mid 2010s, he took over as the Colaiste Choilm, Tullamore senior football manager. Following on from another Tullamore man, Niall Stack, Plunkett has done great work here as Offaly's sole boys only school became very competitive in the Leinster Colleges Senior Football Championship.

Tullamore senior football manager Niall Stack led Colaiste Choilm to the Leinster Colleges Senior “B” Football title in 2020 and Plunkett replaced him – ironically, Stack got the Tullamore senior football job by pipping Plunkett in a vote at a club meeting.

Mark Plunkett and his selectors have done great work in Colaiste Choilm in the past few years and are back at the helm for another year. They reached the Leinster final this year where Naas CBS proved too strong but it is great to see one of Offaly's most important footballing schools competing so well at “A” rather than B level.

Gerry Fahy managed Galway ladies footballers in 2021 but left after a year with unspecified issues arising and the Galway ladies County Board stating that they had been unable to resolve them and were stepping aside in the interest of ladies football in the county. Prior to that, he had done tremendous work with Galway U-21 footballers. He led a very good Galway team to the Connacht title and they were beaten by Dublin in the All-Ireland final, in O'Connor Park in 2017.

An excellent trainer with great drive, he will bring a wealth of experience and knowledge to Offaly and him and Mark Plunkett have a very good relationship. Benny O'Brien comes with a strong pedigree. He was a coach with his native St Brigid's in Roscommon when they won the All-Ireland club senior football title in 2012-13 and he later managed them. He has also been a selector/coach with Offaly minor footballers and is currently managing Ballinagar intermediate footballers.

Brian Darby was a long serving Offaly senior football and he is still a key member of the Rhode team. He is one of a golden generation of Rhode footballers with a couple of pocketfuls of senior football medals and he looks set for a long career in management once his playing career eventually ends in the next couple of years.