‘Forgotten, but not gone…’
The Gerry Buckley Column
Who else but the inimitable Con Houlihan could have come with such a classic one-liner when he encountered a former work colleague from the sadly-defunct Irish Press in Mulligan’s pub in Poolbeg Street a few days after attending a boozy leaving party for said colleague at the same venue?
“Forgotten, but not gone,” the giant Kerryman opined loudly in the direction of his former work mate. Indeed, I took no little pleasure in saying precisely that to my long-time solicitor – a man well able to give and take uncomplimentary remarks himself – when I met him coming out of his former practice mid-morning one day last week.
Con’s classic line came to my mind in a sporting context over the past ten days when an assortment of teams pulled out of games in the once-prestigious O’Byrne Cup, leaving Louth – ironically, the first ‘puller-outer’ themselves – facing Longford in the final.
The latter, like Westmeath, not known for garnering too much silverware over the years, celebrated the arrival of the third millennium with a great O'Byrne Cup final win against a Brendan Lowry-managed Westmeath team. That match in Cusack Park was played with near-championship intensity. Westmeath's north-western neighbours had a parade thereafter through Longford town, and photos of that winning team in 2000 are still on display in certain hostelries throughout the county.
The bridesmaid tag accompanied the home team a year later at the same venue when Luke Dempsey’s charges lost to Meath, a forerunner for three classic championship clashes between the counties later in the year. Westmeath, as used to be the case against their Royal neighbours, won none of them, but still won lots of new admirers outside the county for playing some scintillating football in an eight-game championship odyssey.
The sensational arrival of the late, great Páidí Ó Sé in the Lake County in late 2003 magnified the national interest in the men in maroon and white. Who will ever forget the enormity of the crowd which thronged Cusack Park in January 2004 for another O'Byrne Cup final against the green and gold-clad outfit? A one-point defeat preceded the greatest year in Westmeath’s history, albeit the Delaney Cup was won without disposing of the county's long-time nemesis en route.
The future of the O’Byrne Cup is now very much in doubt, but what is not in doubt is that no match in the competition will ever come close to being watched by a crowd even close to the throngs which descended on Westmeath GAA headquarters that remarkable afternoon 19 years ago.
Westmeath has won the competition on four occasions – 1959, 1964, 1988 and 2019. For the players on the first three winning teams, many of them as good as ever produced in these parts, it was their only tangible success in the county jersey when a Leinster ‘campaign’, with no ‘back door’ thereafter, was frustratedly labelled ‘the annual outing’ by supporters.
Fortunately, a number of the men who defeated a second-string Dublin side in Parnell Park four years ago also have lower division National League medals, while some of them played in two Delaney Cup finals, albeit first-choice Metropolitan sides made the experience less pleasant that they might have liked.
Westmeath also infamously went unbeaten in the 1995 competition, but when Mattie Kerrigan’s men refused to play extra-time away to Wexford in the final, the Slaneysiders were awarded the title.
Started in 1954 as an injury-fundraiser for players, and played continuously since except for 1984 and 1985, its future is in grave doubt after the farcical goings-on in recent days. It is scarcely plausible that any county can’t produce some team or other to fulfil fixtures, especially at a time of year when panels are about to be culled and extra games for fringe players are the order of the day.
Thankfully, the credibility of its sister competition, the Walsh Cup, is still intact and Westmeath’s hurlers got a useful win under their belts in Abbotstown last Saturday, albeit against a very depleted Antrim side.
The result of this surprisingly bad-tempered clash will be forgotten (and gone!) very quickly, but the result of the Bob O’Keeffe Cup clash in TEG Cusack Park on May 27/28 next is almost certain to determine which of the two counties will be in the Leinster championship draw for 2024. Similarly, it looks extremely likely that Joe Fortune’s men will face either Antrim or Laois in a Division 1 relegation play-off some weeks before that.
Accordingly, a win at the resplendent venue last Saturday in what was a ‘home’ game for Westmeath is a small psychological boost ahead of one guaranteed rematch, and a 50:50 chance of another.
The venue for Westmeath's final round robin game next Sunday against Micheál Donoghue’s Dublin has been uncertain, but it now seems that Kinnegad will host this last chance for Fortune’s fringe players to stake a claim for a spot on the bus to Ennis on February 5. A win would be very welcome, but a solid performance is essential as some errors evident in recent weeks – especially in Ballinasloe – will be ruthlessly punished by the Banner County men.
Meanwhile, back to the O’Byrne Cup. My solicitor friend told me that his receptionist still takes calls looking for him, months after he made his retirement public. Never short of a witty remark, I asked him what he advised his receptionist to say. “I told her to tell them I’m dead,” he responded.
Probably good advice that for the powers-that-be in the Leinster Council to give the receptionist in Portlaoise when they are planning their 2024 fixtures this winter: “Tell any county that rings up that the O’Byrne Cup is dead!”