Icons of the proud Augher club recall their first ever Senior Championship victory in 1976…

By Niall Gartland

NESTLED a few miles from Knockmany Forest is the tranquil border village of Augher. It would be entirely unfair to characterise it as a mere one-horse town but it’s hardly an urban hotbed – the 2021 census records a population figure of 391.

Traverse the most well-trodden route through the Clogher Valley via the Ballygawley Roundabout and you’ll be lucky to catch a meaningful glimpse of the main street – at least if you’re paying proper attention – but one thing you will chance upon is Fr Hackett Park on the outskirts of the village. Typically, their football pitch has company in the form of eager youngsters put through their paces by local coaches.

These days, their adult footballers operate at junior level – quite understandable when you consider their constrained playing resources – but there was a time when Augher more than punched above their weight. And that’s still doing an almighty service to their golden generation – a remarkable group of men donning the famous black and amber clinched three Tyrone Senior Championship titles in a ten-year period between the mid-seventies and eighties. The O’Neill Cup first landed back in the village in 1976, a full-half century ago. The most cherished prize in Tyrone club football would pay further visits in 1982 and 1985.

Life moves on but visceral memories of life-defining days remain. It wasn’t all plain-sailing either. Championship final defeats in 1970 and 1973 preceded their breakthrough moment three years later. Emigration took its ravaging toll in a lean spell in the late seventies that saw Augher relegated to the Intermediate ranks, but the influx of new blood acted as the catalyst for a dazzling renaissance.

Last week, four members of those trail-blazing teams convened at the club-grounds to mark the milestone 50th anniversary of their maiden championship triumph – Dessie McKenna, Michael McElroy, Gerry Daly and Paddy McMeel.

We’ll start with Dessie, team captain for their maiden championship win. It wasn’t his first time at the coalface of history – he captained the Tyrone minors to All-Ireland honours in 1973. Also lining out against Cork that day was brother Eugene, an all-time great of Tyrone football (he won three All-Stars in three different positions – an incredible feat).

That same season, Augher locked swords with Ardboe in the county final played in the no-man’s land between Christmas and New Year. Frank McGuigan was in his pomp and they lost – but Augher wouldn’t make the same mistake three years later against the formidable Loughshore side. Dessie takes up the tale.

“Had we come up against Ardboe a few months earlier, we probably would have given them a better game. The wet conditions didn’t suit us, and we were maybe a bit naive as well. Then there was a boy called McGuigan playing, and he was hard enough to handle!

“Three years later, we got our revenge. We overcame Coalisland in the first round, then we beat Owen Roes in Omagh – Paul Donnelly scored a screamer that day.

“In the semi-final we came up against Donaghmore. They were Division 1B, we were Division 1A, but we found ourselves six points down at half-time. Our managers gave us a bit of a rollicking at half-time, but we pushed on – we got a couple of goals, as we tended to do, and won by a couple of points.”

Again, a generational Ardboe team stood in their way of the big prize. Four Senior Championship titles in the previous eight years, including three successive titles between 1971 and 1973 tells its own story and the contrast with Augher couldn’t have been starker in that respect.

A tough task was made even more difficult with the loss of their attacking talisman Paul Donnelly, who broke his leg playing for Tyrone minors three weeks before the final. A footballing prodigy, Donnelly had starred for Augher since he was 15 years old, but fate had intervened and dealt a cruel blow.

He was virtually irreplaceable but the onus was on others to step up to the plate in the scoring stakes. Gerry Daly wryly notes that he ‘knows all about Paul’s injury’ – there would be no hiding place on county final day. Mercifully from his perspective, it all went to script as they claimed a cathartic 3-4 to 1-7 victory against Ardboe.

Gerry said: “Our star forward broke his leg in nine places in an accidental collision in Croke Park against Cork. I’d played in midfield for Augher in the first three games and Mickey McKenna said to me ‘you’re going into full-forward’ for the final.

“I remember the first ball that came in, thinking I really have to score here, but I hit two early wides, probably through nerves. I got a point, which settled me, then I remember Dessie coming through and he hit a rasper – I tried to get out of his road, the full-back blocked it, the ball spun into the air. I ran to palm it in and the poor defender panicked and palmed it into his own net. He was a good fella – I met him in Dessie’s pub years later, and he saw me at the end of the bar and said he was still having nightmares about it.”

Tactics also played their part in Augher’s maiden triumph. Former Tyrone senior manager Tom McKeagney, who passed away last year, juggled a playing and training role and concocted a plan to counteract the already legendary Frank McGuigan. Paddy McMeel takes us through the finer details of a meticulous gameplan.

“We’d a really good minor team in 1974. We won everything that was possible to win – and of that team, the likes of Eugene and Martin ‘Cookie’ McKenna, Seamus Daly, Brendan Cassidy and Paul Donnelly went on to star in the 1976 team.

“At the other end of the spectrum we had Tom McKeagney, who had come from Irvinestown to Augher in the late sixties. Mickey McKenna and Eddie Donnelly were the managers, but Tom was ahead of his time and did a lot of the coaching.

“One of the things he did was position the two corner forwards way out on the touchline – ‘Cookie’ on one side, Seamus on the other, and that left a lot of room down the middle.”

Then there was the small matter of Frank McGuigan. Dessie McKenna was assigned marking duties, but he could never be completely contained so they decidedt attack was the best form of defence.

McMeel said: “We knew Dessie was going to be marking Frank McGuigan, who was the best player I’ve ever seen. Tom said, ‘Any time you get a chance, give Dessie the ball – make sure he gets plenty of it.’ That was the plan, and it worked.

“On top of that, we made sure that the opposite side from where McGuigan was. The two midfielders, Dessie and Willie, were on each side. In the modern game, Wishy [Holland] would be counted as a specialist goalkeeper. Michael McElroy was wing half-back and wasn’t the biggest, but Wishy could pick him out with kickouts. That was way ahead of its time, and those were the things that made the difference on the day.

“Ardboe probably had 60 or 70 per cent of the play, but Augher got them on the break every time. Our transition was brilliant, and we were able to get through for goals – and that was the difference. Goals won it for us.”

McMeel also recalls the presence of Fr PJ Gormley, who had returned from a stint in Zambia to line out for Augher during the championship. And with the O’Neill Cup won, he packed his bags and hopped aboard an early-morning flight to Africa.

“I suppose there was a bit of divine inspiration as Fr PJ Gormley ended up back playing for us. He was probably in his 30s at that stage. So as they say, maybe the grace of God helped us as well. He joined in the celebrations but was up and away the very next morning to head back to Zambia.”

Recalling the celebrations, Michael McElroy says it was all fairly civilised. Dessie McKenna adds that it was only with the passage of time that the younger players came to appreciate the enormity of what was achieved.

McElroy said: “There was no lorry heading up the village or anything that you have now. We just came back and there was food for us. I have very few memories of the game itself for some reason, but I do remember we went in as underdogs after Paul Donnelly had broken his leg. Ardboe had at least five county players, so it was a great win for us.

“We’d such a strong spine up the middle of the game and we were probably just lucky that a lot of those players came along at the one time.”

Dessie added: “It was a mighty occasion, but at the time, being so young, you probably didn’t fully appreciate it. The older players likely appreciated it more — and that’s not belittling it in any way. You can’t put a wise head on young shoulders.

We thought it would be the start of a whole run of championship wins, but it wasn’t. We didn’t win another for six years.”

Their time would come again, though, and three Tyrone Senior Championship successes is a historic achievement by any metric. In an era where traditional giants like Carrickmore, Ardboe and Trillick ruled, Augher proved on that famous day 50 years ago that they belonged with the best of them.