ECHOES of the past will sound around Brewster Park this Sunday. Tears will flow whether Derrrygonnelly Harps or Enniskillen Gaels win the Fermanagh SFC Final.
The latter are aiming for their first county football crown in 15 years. It’s only been a year since the Harps were denied a six-in-a-row by defeat in the decider against Ederney, but regaining the New York Cup would still be hugely meaningful to the men in purple and yellow.
Six years ago the final was delayed due to the sudden death in a workplace accident of Damian McGovern, the club’s Youth chairman and Minor manager. His three sons, Gavin, Rian and Ronan, are part of the senior squad, with Rian likely to start in defence.
This summer the club was hit by another tragedy, coaching officer Peter Jones drowning in Lough Melvin. Two of his sons will be involved against the Gaels, Leigh and Aaron, while another, Nathan has also played senior.
Mick Glynn, part of the Derrygonnelly senior management along with Sean Flanagan, Paul Greene, Emlyn Burns, and former Leitrim manager Shane Ward, spoke of the hurt still felt by Peter’s friends and family:
“It’s an awful tragedy. You forget about it for a while but then it comes back and it’s just so raw, and then you think how it must be for his family, for his lads playing. I suppose football is a release, maybe, for them, and for the family to distract them at times.”
The Joneses are close to the heart of the club, always around, a very popular family, and not only because Peter’s widow Martina is known for sending chocolate fudge down to training, or a chocolate fountain.
“I’d know Peter for 30-plus years and there wasn’t a better clubman in the club,” says Glynn. “Peter would do anything and did everything, from managing, coaching, manual work, voluntary work on various projects. He was just devoted to the club.”
Peter’s influence was particularly strong over players now in their late teens and early 20s, while he was also the U16 manager in Stephen McGullion’s time on that team.
“Two of his sons will be playing for us and we hope to put in a performance that will do his memory proud. In my time in Derrygonnelly Harps there hasn’t been a better clubman than Peter Jones.”
That’s quite the accolade given the stature of people who have raised the Harps from first-time SFC winners in 1995 to become Fermanagh’s dominant force recently.
Francie Rasdale and Sean Smyth are the joint-presidents. The former played a big part in integrating players and supporters when his own nearby Boho St Faber’s club folded in the mid-Seventies, becoming Derrygonnelly chairman. The latter is ‘crabbit’ until the annual Mass for deceased members has been arranged, always keen to recognise those who carried the Harps, especially in tougher times.
The Harps draw from a very big parish, from Boho mountain down to the shores of Lough Erne, and used to run a bus to bring Boho kids down to training. Now though there are no divisions, no politics of any sort, no Sinn Fein/SDLP divide as can occur in other clubs.
The likes of Peter Jones and Damian McGovern, Eamon Maguire and Michael Farrell before them, are inspirations to the present membership to work hard.
Derrygonnelly has long been a well-run, progressive club, with a strong, visionary committee. That effort didn’t always translate into success on the pitch, but at least the club got itself a second one as money was raised for infrastructure improvements.
Harps hands did lift silverware 30 years ago, winning U16 and Minor Division Two, also reaching two Minor championships finals; they lost both, but the talent was clearly there.
The main men who raised the bar even higher were Hugh Kelly and Donal Fee.
Kelly is softly spoken but a huge influence, shaping the coaching structures which began to churn out a production line of talent.
Parish leagues were the start of it, but when they became hard to sustain the club moved onto coaching sessions with internal competitions at the end. The key elements were proper coaching with teams well looked after, but ensuring plenty of games, not a hyper-serious set-up.
Kelly shaped that, and became senior manager. Promotion to Division One came in 1992 and Derrygonnelly have never gone down since.
In terms of Championship, however, the perception was that the Harps needed to be mentally tougher, have more ‘stickability’. The steely Fee, a former Fermanagh corner-back, brought that, with better preparation and focus on the mental aspect of playing too.
Key lieutenants on the pitch then are managing the team today - Sean Flanagan, captain of the 1995 breakthrough team, Paul Greene, who came off the minor team, and full-forward Mick Glynn, who arrived from Galway in the mid-Eighties. Gary Smyth and Donal Corrigan were also important players.
The underage work became really properly structured in the mid-90s and since then plenty of people have been willing to give a lot of time.
Derrygonnelly are constantly developing, improving. They’re looking to build a bigger gym and have bought land for a possible third pitch. Yet the collective focus is not all on capital projects at the expense of coaching, nor is that aimed all at senior; there’s no forgetting the underage. The club balances its work well.
With two or three talents feeding through each year, another crop of young players boosted the 2004 team. That was managed by Glynn and a 31-year-old Brendan Rasdale – who has overseen the development of most Gaels talent too as a teacher and coach at St Michael’s, Enniskillen.
The Harps caused a serious shock then, stopping the Gaels achieving a Fermanagh record-equalling seven senior championships in a row, the victors including young lads such as Declan Cassidy, Danny Ward, Paul Ward, Johnny McGurn, and Aidan Gallagher.
Many of that team only won one more Championship, though, in 2009. Seventeen years on, attacker McGurn has now converted to being the Harps goalkeeper, while Cassidy is still going strong in defence, with Paul Ward on the bench.
Now they meet the Gaels again, for the first time in Championship since that 2004 final.
Traditionally Belcoo and Devenish would have been Derrygonnelly’s rivals, but clearly there’s extra spice against Enniskillen since the Harps took over as top dogs in the Erne County, winning five in a row from 2015 to 2019, before Ederney dethroned them last year.
Most Derrygonnelly boys go to secondary school at either St Michael’s or St Joseph’s College, both in Enniskillen, and end up in university houses together.
Yet there are few bigger rivalries than among friends.
The Harps reached Ulster Club semi-finals in 2017 and 2019, the biggest provincial impact since the Gaels reached the deciders of 1999 and 2002. Yet this year the focus has been fully on Fermanagh to the extent of brothers Ryan and Conall Jones stepping away from the inter-county scene this season.
The League has already been secured – beating Enniskillen in the final, natch – but Championship is what they really want.
If Derrygonnelly don’t win, they’ll be disappointed, obviously; but defeat will be kept in perspective, and the work will go on, as ever.
* Thanks to all who assisted with this article, including Pauric McGurn and A N other/duine eile - you know who you are.
