Ferbane GAA combine poignant trip down memory lane with launch of ambitious plans for future
Star minor regales attendance with memories of historic 1949 win
FERBANE GAA Club have combined a powerful trip down memory lane with the launch of an ambitious development programme to safeguard the future for generations yet to come.
Members of the club gathered last Friday evening for the unveiling of a special commemoration to their heroes of the past while the event co-incided with the launch of plans for a €500,000 upgrade of their impressive club house and the provision of full floodlights at their grounds on the Ballycumber Road.
The first part of the evening was devoted to the memorial to the 14 Ferbane teams that have won the Minor Football Championship – they won their first in 1949 and are only second behind Tullamore in the roll of honour for this championship.
Some of Offaly football's greatest names have won minor football titles for this great club and the club has been absolutely pivotal to the Offaly success story – while they won their first senior football title way back in 1914, their next came in 1971 and that started a golden era as they added 11 in all between 1971 and 2019 to place them joint third on the Offaly roll of honour on 12 with Walsh Island. Their record included a famous five in a row from 1986 to 1990 and a traumatic 25 year famine from 1994 to 2019.
They have been agonisingly close to leaping ahead of Walsh Island in recent years while they provided an Offaly All-Ireland senior winning captain, Tony McTague (1972), a minor one in Sean Grogan (1964) and brothers Sean, Brendan and Mick all won All-Ireland senior football medals in 1982 with Sean also starring in the 1972 win.
McTague and Grogan were on the Ferbane teams that won back to back minor football titles in 1963 and 1964 and the club have regularly won titles in this grade.
The montage of pictures, where available, and other details was brilliantly produced by local firm Brosna Press and the project was overseen by long serving club activist, Brian Flynn. A similar one was carried out previously on their senior football wins and the minor will be followed in due course by their intermediate, junior and U20 winning teams.
Friday's function was enhanced greatly by the presence of the only survivor of the 1949 winning team, 92 year old Mick Kenny, who was in great form as he regaled the audience with his memories of that year and humorous stories.
Their minor championships were won in 1949, 1954, 1963, 1964, 1984, 1989, 1990, 1991, 2011, 2014, 2015, 2017, 2024 and 2025.
Some of the later ones were under the Ferbane-Belmont umbrella and some of their wins featured permission players from other clubs but Brian Flynn said they were putting them all down as Ferbane, which can be taken to mean the whole parish. For example the 1963-1964 wins featured players from Kilcormac, including Paddy Byrne, Mick Spain, Paddy Screeney – the late grandfather of hurling star Adam Screeney – and Christy Hand while Shannonbridge players have had permission to play underage with them in recent years.
The minor teams occupy a cherished part in the great Ferbane GAA success story. They won three in a row from 1989 to 1991 and those unbeatable teams included Kevin Flynn, Cathal Maher and Sean Grennan, who played in both All-Ireland minor hurling and football finals in 1989, winning a hurling medal while Tony McTague's son Colm, Roddy McNamee and James Hiney were also on the football panel.
As with a lot of clubs, family connections seep through successful teams in all sorts of ways. Cathal Maher was present on Friday evening with his son, Eamon, a member of the most recent successful teams. Kevin Flynn was also there as was Sean Grennan's sister, Edel Waldron, mother of Dara, also on the recent teams and a brilliant Offaly minor footballer this year – she was there with younger son, Oran.
There are pictures missing in some cases. There was no picture of the 1949 team but the display includes one of the 1948 squad, which featured some of their first winners. There are other gaps and strangely, there is no picture of the 1991 team.
Mr Flynn appealed to people to come up with pictures and information where possible though Mick Kenny revealed that none was taken of the 1949 team. He stated that their legendary team trainer, Jimmy Dolan made several attempts to get the squad together for a picture but there was always people missing and it never happened.
The montage includes teams and brief details of the finals and they also ran into road blocks here. In some cases, newspaper reports were very sparse and in any case, they only included details of the players who played, not the full panel. It was also challenging to find out the names of team managements and in some cases they had to rely on local memories – and as the years go by, this is not always the most reliable method of ensuring historical accuracy.
It was a great project to undertake and Mr Flynn thanked all who helped him, saluting Brosna Press for their professionalism and support of Ferbane and Offaly GAA.
The club have also won four intermediate and five junior football titles – their last two in each grade achieved by their second team – and this will be tackled next by Mr Flynn and helpers.
The displays will occupy pride of place in the upstairs function room in their renovated club house and the plans for this were outlined by club chairman Padraig Boland.
They will make their club house fully accessible with a new lift installed and a retro-fit will be carried out to meet climate action policies. The provision of full floodlights will enable games to be played there as well as give them more flexibility in their training schedule. Mr Boland noted that they had to rent a floodlit pitch from a neighbouring club when they reached the senior football final last year and wanted to be able to facilitate their own teams.
Other work may follow on the back of this and Mr Boland spoke about Ferbane GAA's role in providing facilities for the whole community and not just their own games. “We don't exist in a vacuum and are very much tied in with the local community,” he declared.
He stated that the club had been “naive” in the way they had refurbished their dressing rooms recently, spending their own money rather than securing the funding that is available from various sources and they would be receiving comprehensive grant aid for the new development.
Mr Boland said that while they are “community based and focused”, their “raison d'etre” was games and winning titles and he hoped this upgrade will help them.
“It is important we remember and celebrate the achievements of the people that went before us but our job is to hand a strong club over to future generations,” he said, speaking about the impact Ferbane's 1971 senior football win had on him as a five year old.
The project will cost €500,000 and Ferbane GAA will have to raise in the region of €120,000 themselves. They have organised a major fundraiser called “Walk the walk or talk the talk” for October and hope this will bring in over €100,000.
That fundraiser will follow the formula that has achieved stunning results for other clubs with a big push on social media forums and an online method of donating. Walkers will walk or jog the approximate 16k of the Grand Canal in Ferbane parish from the Turraun reserve to Shannon Harbour while people who can't do that are asked to pledge their time to a voluntary activity and seek support for doing that – it could be volunteering in a care facility, visiting nursing home residents, getting involved in an underage team and it will be open ended.
That fundraiser will take place in October but Mr Boland said they can't finalise the date until they see how Ferbane football and Belmont hurling teams are doing – he said they hope they will both be in senior football and hurling semi-finals and finals and will decide on a date later in the Autumn.
He concluded by noting that Ferbane won the Division 1 Football League recently for the first time since 2019, when they went onto win the championship and he hoped that was a good omen for their prospects this year.