Best hurler and footballer you've seen play from your own county

Hurling-Joe Cooney

Football-Paraic Joyce

Hopefully in some years we'll be able to put Joe Canning up there
with Joe Cooney but he still has a bit to go to be spoken of in Cooneyesque terms.
Regarding football it has to be Joyce. Donnellann, Fallon, Meehan,
Mannion, Walsh, De Paor all contenders but PJ gets the nod for his
consistency and longevity allied with being the classiest footballer of
all time.

Yeah this is a handy enough one for a Galwegian but as a Dub I will have to give this great thought cos there are so many.

Ulster posters - ye can obviously ignore the hurling part.

Jayo Cluxton wrote:Yeah this is a handy enough one for a Galwegian but as a Dub I will have to give this great thought cos there are so many.

Luckily your old enough to remember.

mossbags wrote:

Jayo Cluxton wrote:Yeah this is a handy enough one for a Galwegian but as a Dub I will have to give this great thought cos there are so many.

Luckily your old enough to remember.

Yaw I suppose. I used to be glued to Joe Cooney on the TV though - especially when he was astride a worried looking sheep about to administer a dose of Nilverm to cure the auld liver fluke.

Jayo Cluxton wrote:

mossbags wrote:

Jayo Cluxton wrote:Yeah this is a handy enough one for a Galwegian but as a Dub I will have to give this great thought cos there are so many.

Luckily your old enough to remember.

Yaw I suppose. I used to be glued to Joe Cooney on the TV though - especially when he was astride a worried looking sheep about to administer a dose of Nilverm to cure the auld liver fluke.

I see your still irked about your dismal showing in the Culchie festival Jayo

Leo Finn from Gort in Co Galway has be selectecd as the King of The Culchies for 2009.


Leo is the guy on the right. Fooking know him well.

Are you the guy on the left Moss?

Jayo Cluxton wrote:Are you the guy on the left Moss?

Sadly I am not but he would be an acquaintance. A character thru and thru. In fairness you never stood a chance against this fella Jayo. 100% culchie and proud.
EDIT Im talkin about the dude on the right. Dunno who the leftie is.

mossbags wrote:

Jayo Cluxton wrote:Are you the guy on the left Moss?

Sadly I am not but he would be an acquaintance. A character thru and thru. In fairness you never stood a chance against this fella Jayo. 100% culchie and proud.

Yeah I gave it my best shot but I was just too sophisticated no matter how hard I tried to hide it. Its very hard to act the gombeen when you are a class act.

Leo is a class act, believe me. Anyway have you managed to remember any decent fballers of hurlers from the capital yet?

Im gonna go for Allister Elliott, Hurling, Club Dunloy, he played brilliantly for us during the bad years at the end of the nineties start of the naughties when we couldnt hardly get out of ulster due to bad teams, managment and many other reasons such as a good derry squad. Flying machine at corner forward, remember us taking a thrashing by offaly in 99 i think, Ally was the only player in the saffron who looked worthy of wearing the jersey or even being in croker, if hed been there in 89 he definitely would have got a couple more scores on the board for us.

In the football im going to go with Sheeny McQuillian, Erins Own, Toome. Class act high feilding mid feilder, almost cancelled anthony tohill out of the game in 2000 until that 45 sheeny kicked in the last minute when tohill saved a point. Sadly had his intercounty career cut short by the city/country politics that exists within antrim gaa, when his club where beating a city team well with only a couple of minutes to go the city team - St Pauls - started a mass brawl leading to the two teams being booted out of the championship with no antrim winners that year, a city dominated county board made the ruling, totally injust in my eyes, im from the city.

As you will have seen i have chosen during my life time as i seen these players at first hand, obviously there is others maybe an older or sorry more experienced antrim supported such as patrique could say another two. I know in the hurling he will think i should have went for clute or sambo, ally was my child hood hero though. Maybe you prefer the term seasoned pat? lol

Can't really look beyond Brian Mullins in for a number of reasons Moss. Curran was another great and Jimmy K deserves mention. There are some quality hurlers there now too - I like the look of McCrabbe and think he will only get better.

I'd say:

Hurling: Joe Cooney
Football: PJ or Kevin Walsh.

Sadly had his intercounty career cut short by the city/country politics
that exists within antrim gaa, when his club where beating a city team
well with only a couple of minutes to go the city team - St Pauls -
started a mass brawl leading to the two teams being booted out of the
championship with no antrim winners that year, a city dominated county
board made the ruling, totally injust in my eyes, im from the city.




Sheeny played about 4 games for Antrim.


Now I live in Antrim Town and would be very friendly with a lot of Cargin lads, but the trouble in 2000 was not started by St Paul's. Joe Quinn was lucky to escape without serious injury.

The trouble was started before the throw in, and right through the game by ONE Cargin player who revels in the fact.

Throw in an element of triumphalism usually associated with 12th of July from the Cargin supporters who invaded the pitch, and that is where the trouble came from.

St Paul's number 7 in that game, Donnelly, may well have been the best Antrim footballer of your era North Side.

I saw a few top class Antrim players, Gerry McCann, Aidan Hamill, JP O'Kane who played for Antrim, Ulster, Louth and Leinster, Bap Armstrong, the above mentioned Donnelly from St Paul's, and others.

However in 2005 I remember telling a group of Tyrone fans that Canavan was the best Ulster forward since Andy McCailin. Obviously Canavan did not have Andy's skill or pace, who did, but would have been more robost and better equipped to win his own ball than Andy.

You would have to give it to Andy.

Hurling, I think I saw "Stout" once when I was young so that would be that.

However people I saw when I could appreciate it? Sean Burns of St John's, Eddie Donnelly of Ballycastle, Seanie Collins of Rossa, Aidan Hamill of Rossa, Brendan McGarry and Seamus Richmond of Loughiel, James McNaughton and Leonard McKeegan of Cushendall, Gary O'Kane of Dunloy. I could go on and on.

Elliot was wonde rful but I only saw hoim play well once in Croke, in a club final when he got a few goals. He never had the strength to combat the close attention he got from people in big games in Croke.

But to conclude, I am going to go for "Humpy" from Ballycastle. For a few years Paul McKillen was the best mid fielder in Ireland.

No mention of Ciaran Barr P - surprised at that or Olcan Mc Fetridge

Piece of cake here.
Packy McGarty was head and shoulders above anybody else in my time. End of matter.

Honourable mention to Cathal Flynn, Josie Murray and Paddy Dolan from the 50's and 60's.
Ballinamore's Olly Honeyman and our own Ben Wrynne carrier the colours valiantly but in vain for the next generation until the emergence of Mickey Martin, Mickey and Seamus Quinn and I would be accused of begrudgery if I omitted Declan Darcy.

Hurling............

Patrique as a seasoned fan you will know what im talking about when i say i was born in 1982, 18 years, no championship wins?

2000 is a year that will live long in the memory for me as will 2009 however i picked sheenys determination and ability to out do down all stars and derry all stars - twice!!

Not going to get into the st pauls thing you obviously seen what you wanted and i seen what i wanted, end of story. If i chose a st pauls player anyway it would be anto finnegan

Best hurler would be any one of 4 Vinny Owens from my own club and 3 guys from Dungannon Brian Padraig and Eamon Devlin - i'm not sure if they are all brothers TC would be able to advise on that one. All good hurlers but the 3 Dungannon lads were savages on a field they'd kill you as quick as look at you.

Best footballer would probably be Canavan

bocerty wrote:No mention of Ciaran Barr P - surprised at that or Olcan Mc Fetridge

No expert on Antrim but the omission of Olcan did come as something of a surprise to me as well I must say.

With regards to Olcan McFetteridge lads, i gave him a mention under his knickname, clute, didnt put him down as my number one but did mention him alongside sambo! Ciaran Barr i dont remember enough of before he went south. Humpy was a hell of a player, brilliant coach too shame those on our county board couldnt see that.

Ciaran Barr was a good player, awful hurler. I also didn't mention my legendary club mate Aidan Thornbury, the original GREAT player, but not a great hurler.

Klute was an excellent player, but Andy McCailin would have been a better hurler, and a better corner forward.

I was thinking today North Side about what age you must be, and realised that Sheeny may have hero status for you, the way Aidan Hamilll was the greatest hurler EVER, bar none, for me. Until I realised better.

Personally I always thought Eddie Quinn was a far better player, and Ciaran O'neill also.

Aned after two days of senility, and asking a former St Paul's player, AIDAN Donnelly was the man. Just couldn't remember his first name.

And Padraig Devlin was a fierce hurler at Queen's.

patrique wrote:And Padraig Devlin was a fierce hurler at Queen's.

did he ever play for Ulster in the Railway Cup P?

boc i think brian and padraig are brothers and eamon is a cousin .

i only saw our hurlers play maybe 10-11 times and i would say vinny owens was the best, unlucky one year art had him on the senior football panel and he missed a promotion play off to be a sub for the footballers.

no doubt in my mind canavan is the best i have seen , he aint called god for nothing!

bocerty wrote:

patrique wrote:And Padraig Devlin was a fierce hurler at Queen's.

did he ever play for Ulster in the Railway Cup P?

I am certain he did.