Down v Armagh – a rivalry renewed

FAMOUS…Down and Armagh has always been one of the game’s greatest rivalries

SUNDAY’S meeting of Down and Armagh will be the first time that Páirc Esler has hosted an Ulster Championship match between the neighbours since 1991.

The game, the names, and the old ground itself have changed considerably from that day in the rain when Down won a forgettable quarter-final 1-7 to 0-8, but the rivalry is just as strong now as it ever was.

That win 26 years ago would be the start of an incredible journey for the Mourne county, and it would also have a huge impact on Armagh too in their own pursuit of glory.

Down’s DJ Kane and Armagh’s Cathal O’Rourke joined Niall McCoy in the stand at the Marshes to talk about their experiences of the famous derby clash.

Niall McCoy: It’s a long time since Down and Armagh clashed here in Ulster, what are your memories of that ‘91 fixture?

Cathal O’Rourke: We played Down a few times about then and they beat us in both matches, ’91 and ‘92. In 1995 I had to come home from America to play against Derry in the Athletic Grounds and it was the only other game that was the same as Down ’92, both were over with 10 or 15 minutes to go. I remember just wishing that the ground would open up and swallow us up.

DJ Kane: I’ll have to go up and look that up; I can’t remember ‘92 at all. I can remember ‘91 alright.

NMC: That ‘91 match was your debut Cathal, you came on for Ger Houlahan.

COR: Is that who I came on for? I remember DJ coming up and scoring a cracker of a point and Liam Austin scoring a great point too. I was gong to do my physics A-Level the next morning, the practical, and I think I had it wired arse about face. I was in the Abbey at the time, DJ had been subbing there the year before. I remember losing the MacRory quarter-final in ‘91. We were set to win it that year because we hadn’t lost a game, we beat the College (St Colman’s) by 23 points and they ended up getting to the final. I was distraught and Val (Kane, DJ’s brother) was trying to help me to get over it, and to do that I went and played with the Armagh u-21s. We beat Monaghan and I scored seven or eight points and got called into the senior panel. I was in the Abbey after that and this knock came on the common room door. The door opened and a teacher yelled “is O’Rourke in the common room?” Never had this teacher spoken to me in seven years but he called me out and said “this football, getting in the way of books, none of this shit matters.” The moment he said I couldn’t do it I thought “frig you” and the two fingers were up at him, “I’ll show you,” I thought. I couldn’t have done my A-Levels without the football, that’s just the way I was built.

DK: In ‘91, I could have just started teaching in Belfast (Lagan College). Any game against Armagh always has that big derby feel to it but we weren’t going that great before it. We had a poor enough league and even the preparation coming up to the match wasn’t brilliant. The numbers weren’t huge at training, not the way you would have now. We were training alright but Pete (McGrath) was getting 14, 15, 16 at it.

NMC: At that stage wasn’t there any inclination that you could do something serious that year?

DK: We might have done something serious but it wouldn’t have been around football. There was definitely no inkling of going on a good run and, to be honest, playing Armagh could go either way so you could be out as quickly as you were in. Like all teams, if you win a few games you get a bit of momentum built up but at that stage we were just looking to get over that first round.

NMC: I imagine the build up in and around Newry was big before the game?

COR: I was isolated, living way out in Dromintee. When you head to Moyry Castle there’s nothing up there but crows. In the Abbey itself there probably was but that game was in June. Everything eased down for you in seventh year at the start of May so I was coming into school when it suited me. I remember going down to Armagh to train on the College Fields and we were doing timed mile laps two weeks out from the Championship. We had Paddy Mo (Moriarty) and Joe (Kernan) as managers and my memory is hopping into Paddy Mo’s car, changing at the Athletic Grounds and heading to the College Fields. At that stage Armagh’s team sort of picked itself. They had reached the Ulster final the year before and Donegal had beaten them. Preparations for our championship were more about the opening of fields, that’s what you were doing instead of challenge matches. It was serious because you’re getting ready for Down, but most teams picked themselves across Ulster. You played three National League games pre-Christmas and four after, so it’s not like now when you play seven games in 10 weeks and a few games leading into championship. The National League ended in early March and you weren’t playing to June, so other than going down and getting lumps taken out of you by Meath and Kildare every second Sunday at pitch openings, you didn’t do much. We always played Meath a week or two before Ulster just to get the beating of all beatings. It all depended on what form they were and who you aggravated.

DK: They (Meath) were a good team to play against though. From 1988 onwards we played them a lot. We played them in a National League quarter-final and we were playing them in pitch openings and things like that. We were sick looking at them but you certainly learned your trade, you learned it quickly or you didn’t survive. You got a good gauge of where you were and what you had to do to beat them. When we eventually ended up meeting Meath in the ‘91 final, Jesus it was still one of the best teams in Ireland but we weren’t overawed because we had ended up playing them so many times. It had all built up to the final, as the rounds go by it brings a whole new world in terms of preparation, dedication, the professionalism that comes into it. Football-wise and fitness-wise, it was more intense and it had to be. The whole thing just mushroomed and the camp had a completely different atmosphere about it. The players took control of it. Pete put in place what we had to do and the players did it. Anyone who didn’t do it, the players sorted it.

COR: Even in 2002, 2001 with ourselves, a manager didn’t have to ring a lad to see why he wasn’t there. (Kieran) McGeeney, (Paul) McGrane, myself, the players were the ones asking. It was particularly the ones who knew the light was going out at the end of the tunnel. We knew that we only had a few years left at this craic so you either commit or you don’t. Down in ‘91 were a team of men, a team of grown men, and we knew around 2000 that we needed to be like that if we were going to make it, so you needed to give everything.

DK: The guys that were playing in the early 90s, as Cathal says, they weren’t 18, 19, 20 like you get now. Boys coming in at that age now are physically developed, but if you put a boy at that age in back then, it was a different ball game. One of the few lads to really make that change was a fella from Cork called Stephen O’Brien. He was only a kid at 18 or 19 and they put him into the full-back line against Meath and he was well fit to hold his own, that was the exception.

COR: We played Cork in ‘92 in the Athletic Grounds and I ran into Stephen O’Brien and I saw every Christmas I had. I was 19 and big and strong but I ran in to him and I was shaking when he hit me and I shook for the next 35 minutes until the game was over. It was a different era when men were well proportioned. A lot of boys now are bulky because they’re doing set weights but players back in that time were labourers, they were in natural trade. We had boys like Marty Toye, Kieran McGurk, wiry but wiry and hard. Then there were the Grimleys, Shane McConville. Down raised the bar for us. Like DJ says with Meath, you played a lot against them and you respected them, but you weren’t in awe. A lot of our Armagh group later on came through the university scene and they got to play with wee James (McCartan) and other Down players, they got used to that standard. Those Down players showed us the level we needed to get to and that was obvious in the ‘91 game and, also, the following year.

NMC: Was the match all but over when you came on in ‘91?

COR: It wasn’t done. Mickey Linden scored a goal from a penalty with 10 or 15 minutes to go and Joe just said “get yourself sorted”. There wasn’t much of a warm up, it was tie your boots and get on. The game was in the melting pot and I remember ‘Monkey’ (Jim McConville) had a great goal chance at the end…

DK: Neil Collins got a hand to it. I think Jim tried to go around Neil, but he got a touch on it and knocked it off. It was definitely a great goal chance, it was one on one.

COR: They got away with it alright and won in the end. We had to go to back to the Carrickdale and everyone was saying you could pick the best of both of those teams and they wouldn’t win another Ulster match. ‘Forget about it, they were going nowhere,’ people were saying about Down. I’m not saying that Down were disorganised that day but Barry Breen was corner-back. I had huge respect for Breen, he had a majestic left foot, a great citeog, but he ended up getting an Allstar that year at midfield. They were really still trying to find their feet.

DK: Pete was still working on players at that stage, it was only the first round. Yeah, we had played a few challenge matches but he was still trying to find his feet in working out the best positions for players. Barry eventually played most of his football out the pitch. He was a guy Pete moved out and then he brought Paul Higgins in as a corner back and Higgins stayed there for the rest of his years. Pete was still trying to adjust so that’s why there were a lot of changes as the games went on. Eamonn Burns changed positions, Conor Deegan changed positions. There was right bit of moving. ‘Austy’ (Liam Austin) got injured against Derry and I don’t think he played until he came on late in the All-Ireland final. It meant that Pete was forced to change things too.

NMC: The full-time whistle goes. It wasn’t a classic, but you’re through a big match, does the outlook change in the dressing room afterwards?

DK: In those days it was more a case of ‘yeah we’re in the semi-final, brilliant. That’s a bit away though’ and we would have went into the Shamrocks club. There would have been food up the town a bit but generally it was into the Shamrocks for a few drinks and a lot of supporters would have been in there too. Nowadays you wouldn’t see a player doing that after a game. If you get beat nowadays you could be out the next week, but we weren’t going to be out for three, four, five weeks. Players went out after to enjoy themselves.

NMC: Even at that stage though it was clear that is was a special Down team though?

DJ: Gary Mason was top scorer in both campaigns we won and if you picked up a newspaper you probably wouldn’t see them ranting and raving about him. Right foot, left foot, off the ground, out of his hands, we had a lot of talent. The talent was there, we had an incredible forward line.

COR: I remember Mick O’Dwyer telling me and Tony McEntee something in Thailand, of all places. He sat us down and told us if you ever take a team make sure you know where your 14 scores are coming from. You need to know on a dirty, wet championship day where those 14 scores were coming from. If you go through that Down team. Ross Carr three, four points, Gary Mason six points – there’s 10 before you open your button. Mickey Linden will get you 1-1, Wee James will get you the goal when you need it, Peter Withnell will get you a goal and a point. Then Eamonn Burns and Barry Breen coming up the field, so you knew those 14 scores were definitely there.

DK: The two boys were bankers (Mason and Carr). I remember one guy saying to me ‘you haven’t scored much from play’ and I said to him ‘if they stopped fouling us we wouldn’t kick as many from frees.’ If you fouled inside 45 yards we didn’t miss. That proved itself in the draw in ’91 against Derry when Ross hit the long free to get the draw. He might tell you it was 80 yards now, it wasn’t that far but it was a big one and it got us out of jail. It can be a real boost when you know you’ll have eight, nine points a day through frees.

COR: We had that as well when we were successful. Oisin McConville averaged five, I had three and then Paddy McKeever after me. Add in (Diarmaid) Marsden, Rony Clarke, Stevie (McDonnell) and you were sorted. O’Dwyer told us in 2000 that we would go close because he said he could pick six forwards that would get us 14 scores on a dirty, wet championship. Down had that in ‘91.

NMC: Derry beat you heavily in 1993 DJ and there was talk that you were going to call it a day, was there any truth in that?

DK: There probably was. Things hadn’t panned out the way we had hoped that they would after ‘91 and there was a lull. The enjoyment and the entertainment was taken too far and it was a case of were we going to get refocused? But the players sat down and said right we’re going to have another go at this and see what happens. Lucky enough it worked out but to be honest we were probably good enough for another All-Ireland. It’s all ifs and buts though.

NMC: Was the 1994 win more enjoyable because you were captain?

DK: It’s like anything, the first time you win an All-Ireland is going to be the special one. The other one was great although I didn’t think I’d still be the last Down captain to lift Sam at this stage – but you can’t beat the first. I still get the odd free pint and turkey and ham dinner out of that second one though.

NMC: DJ was winning plenty in the early 90s but you had to wait later for that sort of joy Cathal?

COR: I became the journeyman pro. It was my 12th season in 2002 when we won the Sam Maguire. Your timing needs to be right. I looked up to DJ’s brother Val in the Abbey, he was a real mentor to me and he was someone who I loved and hated in equal measure depending on how he trained me that week. He turned a lot of that Armagh team into men in the Abbey. Himself and Brother Ennis deserve a lot of credit for that Armagh success. The McEntees, the McNultys, they all came out of the Abbey. From our point of view, we were always the poor trodden on wee Armagh boys against Down. When Down got into a position of power and had their foot on your throat, they could kill a game like that. They did that us to in ‘91 and again in ‘92 As time went on, myself, McGeeney, McGrane, Marsden, we all found ourselves at about 27, 28 and in our prime when the Down boys were retiring. We came into our prime at the right time. Down were on the dip, Derry were on the dip, Tyrone were on the dip. We then had a great crash course with the Cross ones coming through as well as our Aidan, the McNultys. You need a lot of suns coming together to be successful. It all came together for us. All of a sudden you’re on a football field looking around and you’re thinking, if we get it right here we could do something. We beat Galway, the All-Ireland champions, in ‘98 down in Salthill and that was the game for us, a huge turning point for us. That was us walking out of there going into the Christmas break and thinking ‘we’re good enough for it’. It was a seminal moment for us. We all trusted each other because we came through the tough times, losing to Derry teams beating us with one arm tied behind their backs, a class Down team that beat us back-to-back. If we had disintegrated, said we’re sick of all the crap, the fans criticising, it would have been over but the core of 10 or 12 of us took charge. The manager facilitates but the players were empowered at that stage. Down in ‘99 was the bogey, but we had beaten them in ‘98 and we were ready for them again the next year. We had a team meeting in ‘99 before the Ulster final and one of our players said “I’ve struggled to beat Down, I’ve lost to them in ‘91, ‘92,” and they were essentially telling my life story. One of the McEntees stood up and said ‘Well talk for yourself, I’ve never lost to the them.” He was being real, he was saying you might think you lose to them, but I haven’t lost to Down. I wouldn’t say it was arrogance but it definitely a confidence that helped us.

NMC: There hasn’t been too many chapters since then, but the next one is back here on June 4, what’s your thoughts going into this game?

DK: At the end of the day neither team is near the top tier of Gaelic football at the minute. Maybe in days gone back, teams always had a chance of going on a run but at the minute there is such a gap that it’s unreal. Whichever teams wins it will be great for them, it will keep boys interested, keep boys from flying away to America. But for either team going forward? Yeah they could get a run but the odds of winning anything are stacked against them.

COR: I watched Down here against Fermanagh and they were terrible, absolutely brutal. Over the course of the next three or four games after that there was a really rapid improvement. They played against Galway and whilst you could see the difference when Galway put down the hammer in the last quarter, you could still see the improvement in Down. Armagh seem to be the same, they’re a match for everyone for 50 minutes then the problems happen. They are two mid-table second division teams and this game is really about bragging rights. Tyrone, Monaghan and Donegal are a chasm for everyone else in Ulster and I’d be very surprised if anyone makes an impression on any of these teams.
Whoever wins the game, they’ll not lose the run of themselves, but it just takes them to win that second game for maybe things to change. In ‘99 we crawled across the line in the semi-final against Derry when Henry Downey hit the best shoulder you’ll see on Paddy McKeever and the referee gave us a free 35 yards out. It turned the game and our trajectory went up from there. The last 20 minutes, or as the Americans call it the championship quarter, really hurts these two teams, but it’s anther reason why they’re well matched.

NMC: Is the Armagh-Down rivalry friendlier than people think?

COR: Christ no. I hated Down with a passion. DJ once asked me when our Aidan took the Down assistants job “what must your mother and father be thinking?” That was one of the kinder things DJ asked over the course of our time. We felt as if Down rubbed it in our faces. The Abbey felt like a Down school that had let in a few stragglers from Armagh just to tidy things along for the grants. South Armagh always felt like the black hole of Armagh never mind the black hole of Ulster so we loved to play with a chip on our shoulder. We’d take any chip we could get and for the south Armagh men it was definitely Down. It was bred into you, it was bred into you.

DJ: I hated everybody I played against, certainly for the time the match went on anyway. The Armagh rivalry was big and in those days because it was a knockout it was even bigger. I loved to beat them. I wouldn’t have known a lot of them which increases it for me – you don’t know them socially, so even more so you don’t like them. It builds up, particularly in Newry. Down, luckily enough, had a tradition of winning All-Irelands and with that came a bit of arrogance. When I played though the bigger clashes were usually with Derry and Tyrone but the historical one was always Armagh. It was bred into you for years, all the stories that you’d hear, you just grew up with it.

NMC: And who is going to be the latest holder of these particular bragging rights?

COR: Down, on account of home advantage.

DJ: That’s very good of Cathal, we’ll go with that one.