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"It could well have been a Longford Down AIF if Longford hadn't had their key mid-fielder injured in the Leinster Final



This is a well held view in Longford and I'll go one step further. We would have beaten Down.

But the world is full of mebbess, aunts with balls, what ifs etc so we don't dwell on it.

Says he, dwelling on it!"

That has been believed for a long time and I first heard it expressed a long time ago, 8 days after Longford were beaten when a member of the team attended a Down wedding - You can imagine the craic at the wedding with Down scheduled to play Galway 10 days after the wedding and 4 members of the Down 1960 there

1968 AIF Down v Kerry Age 9.
With Father and three of his mates.
Stopped in Longford on the way home. An old man said "Mayo ye're like ourselves(Longford). Ye'll win nothin". Was outraged at the time. Hard to recognise a prophet!

It could well have been a Longford Down AIF if Longford hadn't had their key mid-fielder injured in the Leinster Final

1968 AIF Down v Kerry Age 9.
With Father and three of his mates.
Stopped in Longford on the way home. An old man said "Mayo ye're like ourselves(Longford). Ye'll win nothin". Was outraged at the time. Hard to recognise a prophet!

"The Galway goal which turned the game was scored by Cummings, who is apparently a grandson of the late Down great Patsy O'Hagan"
That's right - Both his maternal grandparents were from Down, Patsy from Cabra and Kay from Banbridge

Leo Barry's mark in the dying seconds of the 2005 Sydney Swans grand final win

That's just an ungainly scramble for the ball by an ugly mob.

This is a mark.
Mick O Connell  soaring above Sean O'Neill and John Purdy

That's a foul! Mick's knee in Purdy's back. Despite being "probably"the best footballer that ever lived in many people's opinion.....he wasn't afraid to indulge in other ways to gain an advantage! Even Kerry people have told me yarns.

Dara O'Se often had the same action when rising for a ball

Hope this helps someone, preferably the elderly folks referred to above, but even if it helps only one person, it's worth my time writing it up - I was a heavy smoker from my early teens to early 30's - Decided to quit and went to a hypnotist to quit – I discovered through that process a very important fact; that I didn't want to quit at all as I loved smoking so much! – So I was at the stage of wanting- to- want to quit – And I simply prayed about it asking that I be moved along the process – Sounds corny but it worked – (I'm looking forward to the humorous cracks some of you folks will make about that as some of you are truly talented in the humor department) – Regardless, I went from wanting-to-want to quit, to wanting-to quit, to developing a plan and time to quit, following through on the plan and quitting – That was 29 years ago and I haven't had a cigarette since – The plan was to set a specific day and time when I would finish my last cigarette and go cold turkey, and chewed Nicorette gum for a week – I'm not a gum chewer but I did it for a week, and then I planked Nicorette gum for a year in all kinds of places around the house, at work, and in my car, figuring that if I had to, I'd chew the gum before lighting up again – I haven't had to chew anymore gum after that first week – 29 years later I still love the smell of a freshly lit cigarette and often find myself sliding up closer to someone who just lit up so as to smell that smoke, weird, eh! – Note the word "freshly "above as I don't care for the smell of stale smoke.
Off on a little tangent – My fishing buddy chewed tobacco for about the same amount of time I smoked and he quit around the same time – He developed a small stain on his tongue that was monitored annually for close to 25 years – Then it turned cancerous and he had a portion of his tongue and all of his lymph nodes removed – I have a photo of him in intensive care immediately after coming out of the OR that shows him with quite an necklace – It has taken him nearly 5 years to get back his (almost) full speech and his (almost) full taste buds – I showed the photo to a young man 3 years ago who was a tobacco chewer and he hasn't chewed since – I see him periodically and he told me that he wanted to quit but needed a trigger to do so, and the photo I showed him was the trigger he needed – I'd be willing to share the photo with anyone who wants it if you PM me
Hope this helps someone

"If ballela-angel is right and that's the Longford captain, then it's Longford v Dublin (looks like the late 50s early 60s) and a quick check of the records shows the 1965 Leinster final was between these two counties.  The Dublin captain sporting an early skin tight geansai...John Timmons??"

I checked with Brendan Barden overnight and here's his e-mail to me "That was the Leinster final 1965 against Dublin John Timmons was Dublin captain we were beaten by two points having missed a penalty and Timmons scored two goals with two high lobbed kicks which went straight over the keepers head, keeper never played again - I think the ref was from Louth  maybe mcardle"

"Wrong on both counts for me which is why I don't gamble. Was thinking of a great seat you had for one of the games, now thinking that wasn't Croke. Memory not what it used to be!"
I believe you're thinking of 1968 when I was in the dug-out

The player on the left is Brendan Barden who captained Longford in the 60's - Not sure of the occasion, but maybe it's a National League semi-final or final, or maybe the Leinster final of 1968 - Had lunch with him last week and he's doing grand

Oops! Apologies to Don Corleone there - I just read his post and he beat me by a couple of years - Looks like we're both old geezers!

"So it looks like I am provisional oldest lemon here until some auld timers like Hardy and Lar naParka row in - My money's on Ballela Angel, win double for the best story as well. Don't let me down now BA!"

I think I am from the submittals so far - 1959 AI semi-final, Down V Galway - We got stuffed! - I was 7 and cried my eyes out watching Leo Murphy have an awful day against Sean Purcell, as Leo was best buddies with the fella who was dating one of my sisters at the time - I remember the rake of bicycles in Dublin on Clonliffe Road - Not sure which story's Passedit is referring to

You should be able to pick it up on the network stream - I didn't check but try the Fox Sports home page

Are any radio stations streaming today's game?

In January 2012 I wrote this on another thread here on the board - I wanted to post it again, especially for the younger members of the board who did not experience the full brunt of Paisley's hatred - I did and I know we won't see the first part of the interview until Monday documentary, so comments about it must wait until it's aired - But I'd hope that what I have included below will help you avoid buying into any attempts he might make in re-writing history - When watching the show remember the sentence below where Leon Uris states that  "If a man could be singled out as responsible for the tragic condition of Northern Ireland, no one has more to answer for than Ian Paisley"
"In 1973 Leon Uris, the author of Trinity, Exodus and some other notable novels wrote the text for a pictorial book his wife, Jill Uris was publishing entitled "Ireland – A Terrible Beauty"  - In it he had the following to say regarding Ian Paisley "His most notable victory was attained in collapsing the O'Neil government over Civil Rights and getting himself elected to both Stormont and to Westminster. His political mentor, a standoffish barrister named Desmond Boal, cleaned up Paisley's act for the British Parliament;  here he has shown himself to be a reasonable man with wit and mock candor that have hoodwinked thousands in Ulster, Britain and even Ireland. In support of a most remarkable Jekyll and Hyde charade, His Puritan Press runs overtime with a nonstop barrage of hate literature ............ Ian Paisley is not so naïve as not to learn from his chosen enemy. He has created his own papacy in some three dozen Free Presbyterian churches (Written in 1973, this number has grown significantly since then) ...... Paisley is the Moderator, a Protestant Pope complete with infallibility. Confession, the use of ministers in a role similar to that of Catholic priests, and many other adaptations are straight from Rome. He practices it all with a totalitarianism that few Catholic churchmen practice ........ If a man could be singled out as responsible for the tragic condition of Northern Ireland, no one has more to answer for than Ian Paisley"
I was very struck by that last sentence when I first read it many years ago because I knew in my heart that it was true
I had been aware of Paisley and his infant organization from the early 60's when he had "converted" a young Tyrone girl from Catholicism to his brand of Presbyterianism (I knew about it as I was friendly with one of the girl's neighbors) – During the Civil Rights area, I came to realize that Paisley was an evil person, especially after the incident at Burntollet Bridge – Ian Uris opens his piece on Paisley with this "The most diabolical by-product of three hundred and fifty years of the plantation of Ulster is a cancerous growth known as Paisleyism ....... Few men possess the power to hate with such magnitude, and more frightening, few have the energy and ability to transmit and infect fellow creatures with that hatred"

Anyone know if this match is on radio or being streamed?