Donegal clubs' long road to Ulster glory - A tale of near misses and new hope

It would take the format of a different version of the same old story – another painful defeat for Donegal teams in the Ulster club championship.  

For years it was deemed as a Donegal football graveyard. The simple and unavoidable fact was that the county representatives in the provincial club competition would continue to find ways to lose games.  

There were many near misses along the way, but that doesn’t pave over the county’s poor record in Ulster. Those near-miss fables were as ancient as the Children of Lir or Cú Chulainn.  

Former Donegal footballer Kevin Cassidy pointed to the fact that the county’s history in the competition was so below par that there was no roadmap to follow in attempting to find their way to provincial glory.  

Cassidy and his Gaoth Dobhair teammates would eventually do it in 2018, bridging a gap of 43 years.  

Killybegs would appear from the doldrums in 1991 and place themselves in a final, with Naomh Conaill being the next team to follow suit 19 years later, before a Glenswilly side, largely led by one Michael Murphy would also appear in a final in 2013, but again fall at the final hurdle. 

The act of a team pulling themselves together for the Ulster competition seems to have only become part and parcel with a county success in recent years.  

It is something that Cassidy discovered when comparing his two outings in the Ulster club championship in 2006 and when his team won it in 2018.  

Nobody from Gaoth Dobhair was mincing their words in 2018. Their sole focus was for more glory.  

“I remember when we won the county title in 2018, quickly after the game when we beat Naomh Conaill that night before we went off to celebrate, we huddled up and asked the question, do we want to go for this Ulster title,” Cassidy said.  

“We could’ve celebrated and left it at that, but the general consensus was that we wanted to knuckle down and get back on the pitch on Tuesday and get ready for the Ulster championship.  

“It was a completely different attitude from when we were last there in 2006. I remember we played Crossmaglen in the first round, and the week before that game, our captain James Gallagher got married and we all went to the wedding and the afterparty, and we all enjoyed ourselves.  

“But then you have to go out and play Cross the following week, and hoping you can beat them. James was on his honeymoon, and so was Sean Diver, so that was where we were at. We didn’t take it that serious back then, which was a pity.”  

It ended a long-running drought that hadn’t been achieved since the great St Joseph’s side of the 60s and 70s. Two unofficial titles were captured in ’66 and ’67 before they won it officially in 1975. 

Brian McEniff remembers his and Donegal's first Ulster club campaign back in 1966 against St John's of Antrim: "We went into the game short Pauric McShea (eye injury) and Mickey McLoone (knee). We beat St John's, who were the champions in the two previous years."  

There were some tough games for St Joseph's, who made the breakthrough in 1967 beating Carrickmore in the semi-final but the final against Crossmaglen was postponed until March 1968 because of an outbreak of Foot and Mouth.  

They went on to defeat Crossmaglen by a point in Belfast and subsequently defeated Dunmore McHales over two legs in Bundoran and Tuam to become All-Ireland champions.  

"There was no breakthrough after that until 1975 when we beat Castleblayney Faughs in the final,” the 1992 All-Ireland winning manager said.  

“Over the years we haven't done that well but I do remember 1991 when we played Termon in a club game and then went to Omagh to support Killybegs in the Ulster final. But they were denied by Nudie Hughes’ side that day. 

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"A good Ballyshannon side ran Burren to a replay and they defeated Errigal Ciaran at home in '94, but by and large Donegal sides have not done as well as they should," said McEniff.  

Perhaps Killybegs came the closest. A side often regarded as the best Donegal club football ever produced when between 1988 and 1996, they won five of the eight championships out of seven final appearances.  

The team was littered with household names, with players like Barry McGowan, Manus Boyle, Barry Cunningham and John Cunningham going on to win All-Ireland senior medals in 1992.  

To them, success was second nature when in ’91 as Donegal champions, Killybegs defeated Dungiven, the Derry champions, and the Down champions, Downpatrick, on their way to an Ulster final, only to lose out to Castleblayney on a 0-8 to 0-6 scoreline.  

“Our mindset was always to go out and win everything we could,” Barry McGowan told Donegal Live.  

“Why could we get to a final ahead of other teams in the county? I suppose a lot of people would say it was like a freak of nature that we had so many talented players born in 1967. That year we had a team that was just winning everything from U-12 up to senior level.  

“That success kept progressing all the time, and then you add that to a lot of people working in the town with the fishing industry and being available to play for the club, so all that helped us and really helped club football in the south west area at the time.”  

And while McGowan agrees with Cassidy’s point of Donegal teams not having a great history to take inspiration from in the Ulster club championship, he never felt that they didn’t belong at the top table to be challenging the best teams in the province.  

“Maybe the fact that Donegal teams couldn’t make that jump is because the county championship was so hard to win, so you’d be so battered and bruised by the time Ulster came along,” McGowan said.  

“But we always felt that we were as good as anyone on our day. The final in 1991 was so unfortunate because we lost to a Castleblayney team who were probably the worst out of the three teams we played out of them, Dungiven, and Downpatrick.  

“I think it was always a pity that we didn’t do better in the other years, but that’s sport I suppose.”  

And so, too, a Donegal side returns to Ulster this weekend as St Eunan’s become the newest team on their hunt for Ulster glory as they aim to become only the third club from the county to win the Seamus McFerran Cup.  

They know the challenge ahead of them and how hard it will be. After all, if it was an easy task, Donegal clubs would’ve won it every year.