One club, three codes: The Crosserlough story

Crosserlough men look ahead to Sunday’s Cavan senior football final. Dig deep and they are a thriving club across three codes. Michael McMullan chatted with club Chairman Adrian O’Reilly

“IT resembled a contest between 42 dangerous and ferocious wire-haired lunatics.”

That’s how the first recorded Crosserlough Gaels game was depicted.

Their opponents were Killinkere. It was 1903 and Master McGann had brought together Crosserlough Young Irelanders and the nearby Leehary Emmet’s.

After meetings in Dan Corr’s house, Crosserlough Gaels was formed.

There was controversy attached to their first county final in 1912. Roll of honour leaders Cornafean had two of their 20 titles to their name at the time.

It was a game played in a hurricane. After having the elements at their back and failing to score, Cornafean refused to play the second half.

The game was abandoned when the referee, Fr Rudden, didn’t submit his report on Irish watermarked paper.

A replay was awarded with Cornafean winning by a single point.

The Gaels won their first trophy five years later, the Division Two league.

Football declined in the thirties. After a total absence of two years, a team raised its head in 1940 in Kilnaleck before the Gaels was recognised under chairman Pat Reilly in 1949.

Back-to-back minor winning teams in the fifties formed the spine of their 1958 side who collected the first of their 10 senior titles. Virginia’s late show in the final stopped them retaining the title they regained in 1961.

After getting their hands on the cup in 1966, it was the beginning of Cavan’s only seven-in-a-row.

In 1967, they also won the junior title while reaching the final of the minor championship. They were the force in Cavan and took Down giants Bryansford to within a point in the 1969 Ulster final.

Players such as Ulster star John Joe Reilly, Donal Crotty and Andy McCabe were to the fore. Genie Cusack could make the ball dance.

There were half a dozen more final defeats before Crosserlough ended their famine in 2020.

A prominent Gowna team beat then 1997 when current chairman Adrian O’Reilly, one of four brothers, lined out. There was a final defeat in 1980 to a Kingscourt team in their prime.

“More recently, we lost one in 2018 to Castlerahan,” O’Reilly adds. “They won the double-double in ‘18 and ’19, the league and championship.”

Before that, Cavan Gaels dominated the scene. Now it is more open with six different winners in the last decade.

“Our biggest rivals in the last couple of years, there’s no doubt about it, there’s always a little hair flying when we play Gowna,” O’Reilly jokes.

“We’ve had a couple of good battles with them in the last couple of years. This is actually our first time we’ve met Ramor in the senior final.”

Ramor were two-point winners when the sides met in the league semi-final back in July after Crosserlough won league in the previous two seasons.

Sunday is a new chapter. The biggest one yet.

After the 1997 final defeat, Crosserlough’s aging team disintegrated. There was a drop to intermediate and a narrow final defeat at the hands of Drumgoon in 2010.

In the younger ranks, 2020 senior winning manager Jimmy Higgins was building a team that went unbeaten through u-12, u-14 and u-16 on their way to the 2016 minor title.

He wasn’t on his own – 1997 Ulster winner Philip Smith, Pauric Lynch, Donal and Breen Smith were others with their shoulders leant against the wheel.

“The vast majority of the senior team at the moment all nearly came from the one minor team,” O’Reilly said.

James Smith hit 2-1 in the final against Knockbride. It was captained by Patrick O’Reilly at full-back. Current scoring ace Patrick Lynch. Conor Rehill, John Cooke, Brandon Boylan, Peter and Stephen Smith were also on board.

“I always say, you can have the best coaching in the world, but at the end of the day, if you don’t have the raw materials, you’re going nowhere,” O’Reilly said of a group that will lead the charge on Sunday again.

Others were the older lads Dara McVeety and David Shalvey. McVeety captained the side in the 2018 final defeat but missed the successful 2020 season.

He is back knocking on Sunday again. On the other side, joint captains from 20 Mark Stuart and Pierce Smith won’t run out at Kingspan Breffni.

Smith is in Australia while a hip injury reduced Stuart to some recreational football but he threw his lot in with the management of the ladies’ team who lost narrowly to Lurgan in the final.

“If anyone had told me we’d win a senior championship without Dara McVeety, I wouldn’t have believed them,” O’Reilly said of 2020.

“He is back again looking to win. That final was played during Covid, I think everything closed down on the Monday.”

It was a time when attendances were curtailed. Any hill overlooking a pitch would’ve had fans peeking for a look. O’Reilly remembers their win over Ramor that year when Crosserlough’s unanswered 1-6 in the closing stages won a barnstorming 3-12 to 3-10 encounter.

“I remember going to the Crosskeys that night,” he recalls. “We were eight points down and I remember the field adjacent to it.

“I’d say there must have been 100 or 200 people in the field overlooking the field because they couldn’t get into the venue…crazy times.”

If Crosserlough can repeat the dose on Sunday the numbers will be greater and there will be a brisker trade in the various hostelries. They’ll make up for 2020.

It has been a month of the county final fever in Crosserlough. The ladies’ footballers lost their senior final but won the junior title.

The senior camogs lost their final but the juniors took home the silverware and await the Armagh champions next month in the Ulster series.

There were families with players pulling on the club colours across all codes.

After being part of the Inny Gaels amalgamation with Castlerahan, ladies football began on its own in Crosserlough. Within two years they’ve won two senior championships.

There was camogie in the fifties. After a lack of competition, it reformed at the turn of the seventies before it was re-established in 1982. It’s been part of the GAA family since.

“We won our first camogie title in 1999,” O’Reilly said. “My wife was the captain and they were celebrated before the recent camogie final, 25 years on.”

It’s busy balancing it all in Crosserlough but they make it work. They embrace the ‘One Club’ model. Everybody works, everybody raises funds, there is one treasurer and everything goes into the one purse.

O’Reilly is the overall chairperson. There is a chair for both camogie and ladies’ football.

In eight years of different committee roles, he doesn’t recall any fall outs. Not one. There have been issues to iron out but there’s always accommodation.

How?

“Good integration, people being adults and cooperation,” he sums up. “Conflict. it never happens. Managers work out nights for training and everyone gets on very well.”

O’Reilly’s motto – don’t come with a problem, come with a solution.

There was an important link. It all goes back to Kevin Smith, a Trojan worker in the club who died following a battle with cancer just under two years ago.

The date rolls off O’Reilly’s tongue with ease – December 29, 2022.

The club’s integration is down to Smith. A former treasurer of his native Killygarry, he moved to Crosserlough and fitted like a glove. On Saturday, Crosserlough will dedicate their stand in his memory. That’s the legacy he leaves.

“He integrated the whole lot. To say he was unbelievable would be an understatement.

“We were renaming our stand on Saturday, the day before the county final to Kevin’s Stand. He was basically the link that brought everyone together.”

Kevin Smith got things done. He’d ask and people would flock to help.

“If Kevin said we’ve a job on this Saturday at eight o’clock in the morning,” O’Reilly says, “Kevin would be up there from six. He had serious contacts and just knew how to get everything done.”

The club will put their arm around Kevin’s wife Olivia and the family on Saturday. They’ll never forget him. That’s what clubs do. There is always support.

Crosserlough are like Sleacht Néill and like Dunloy and like Loughmore Castleiney. They have more than one string to their bow. Many codes, one family.

On Sunday, it’s time to get behind the men. All roads will lead to Kingspan Breffni. They’ll hope for title number 11. They’ve had to shoot for scores without Paddy Lynch but they’ve a defence that have kept a championship clean sheet aside from a penalty against Lavey.

It was 42 dangerous and ferocious wire-haired lunatics against Killinkere in 1903. The Gaels of Crosserlough will be hoping the 2024 drop can be just as ferocious.

TITLE TIME…Joint-captains Mark Stuart and Pierce Smith lift the cup after Crosserlough’s 2020 championship win

STALWART…The late Kevin Smith was heavily involved with Crosserlough

SMALL BALL…Crosserlough intermedaite camogie team were champions in Cavan in 2024

CHAMPIONS…The Crosserlough ladies celebrate success last weekend

LAST TIME…Crosserlough’s last Cavan Senior Championship title came in 2020