From second last to having a blast: Donegal's 1972 Ulster triumph recalled

As the Donegal County Board prepares to salute the history-making heroes of 1972, there is one man who stands out from the crowd.

And that is the one and only Brian ‘Ogie’ McEniff, the greatest of all of our Gaelic chiefs. It is hard to believe that he will be 80 in December.

But, on a rainy day in Clones in 1972, McEniff was player-manager of the team that took the county's first ever Ulster title. Fifty years on, the County Board are preparing to honour those heroes at the county final in Ballybofey and it will be a very special occasion for “McEniff and his comrades.

But the story of how this team came from being ranked as 31st in the country in 1971 with only Kilkenny, not a noted bastion of football, were behind Donegal is quite remarkable. For it saw a youthful McEniff taking the reins as player manager and the rest is history. He was the first in the country, and he was also player-manager in 1974 when Donegal regained the Ulster title.

And then he went on to manage the county to Ulster titles in 1983 and 1990 and 1992 and went on to win a magical All-Ireland title in 1992 as well as managing Ulster to a screed of provincial titles and the Irish team in the Compromise Rules series.

But the background to that great victory in 1972 was quite remarkable in itself. He spoke of the sheer elation and joy it brought to the county as well as telling a few interesting anecdotes.

“The county was at its lowest ebb ever and Leitrim beat us in December, and they had not won a match for 18 months,” McEniff said this week. “Leitrim not only beat us but hammered us and we had a serious talk about where we were as a county.

“We were looking for a manager so I tried Mick Higgins, the ex-Cavan great, and he said would not take it and told me to take the job myself and that he would help me. But I still kept looking for others and nobody seemed to want it. And the stats in the Sunday Press at the end of the year had put Donegal as 31st in the country.”

So McEniff stepped into the breach just as he had done later in 2003 when he was also county chairman, and took Donegal to an All-Ireland semi-final - a feat that will probably never be equalled

“I got them all together and we started training in earnest, played a draw with Monaghan in the League and the one chink of light was playing Down in the Dr McKenna Cup in Newry and we drew so that brought some hope,” he said of 1972.

“I did not put out a full team for the replay and Down beat us, but I was not unhappy about it. Our whole focus was on Down in the first round of the championship in Ballybofey in 1972.

“We won that match, and it was a huge psychological win as we had not beaten them in championship football since the 1950s”.

Next up was another Ulster giant called Cavan. “I was on the Ulster Council at the time, and I got the Cavan match in the semi-final fixed for Irvinestown and not Clones because it was like a home match for Cavan,” McEniff added. “So, we got it switched to Irvinestown, but by half time Cavan were up by six points and it was a drizzly day and I remember Cavan leaving us standing on the pitch for two or three minutes. I remember a wise guy saying, send out the jerseys.

“But I had seen this young lad called Mickey Sweeney and he was just out of Templemore in gardai. He was an exciting pacey player and I put him in, and he upset Cavan and Joe Winston was kicking everything over the bar in the second half. And we managed a draw, and the replay was for Clones and we played very well, and we beat Cavan and we were in the Ulster final against Tyrone. That was a big psychological victory for us as Cavan had a bit of a hoodoo over us as well”.

McEniff trained the team himself with some help from Anthony Gallagher, a midfielder whom he converted into a centre-back.
“Anthony went off to Strawberry Hill College in England to be a PE teacher and he showed us some new drills that we had never seen before which were quite effective. This was our third Ulster final appearance but there was no huge build up like there would be today.

“But people were coming to watch us train in MacCumhaill Park which was nice, and we got into good shape. Martin Carney brought a bit of extra dash; he was a very good player.

“There were six St Joseph's men on the team, Martin Carney, Seamie Granaghan, Alan Kane, Declan O'Carroll, Pauric McShea and me, three Ballyshannon and three from Bundoran. We had two in the subs as well in Ray Sheerin, Peter Barry and Josie Boyle. Sadly, Mickey McLoone had a major knee operation and missed it.

“It was a wet day and I remember it for a different reason as there were clothes that were left boiling in the pot in the Holyrood Hotel and the whole place was covered in smoke and I was woken up at 6 am and was not amused.

“I remember watching the Quiet Man along with the late Peter Quinn the night before. I remember the first half and I was not happy with my form, and I came in and took a hot shower and then a cold shower and fresh gear and that helped. Tyrone were ahead by five points and got a punched goal from Brendan Dolan who was killed in a car accident afterwards. We were not at ourselves in the first half and no matter how hard we tried we just seemed to not be able to pull back those three or four points.

“And then Mickey Sweeney came on and he got a goal and that brought it back down to two and I kicked an equalising point to draw the game. Seamus Bonar hit a high ball into the Tyrone goal and their goalie helped it into the net and then I got another point to put us four up and we saw it out”.

McEniff was marking Paddy McMahon who had long hair and a beard on that famous day who was doing PE along with PJ McGowan over in Manchester.

“When the final whistle went, the excitement and elation was just as big as when we won the All-Ireland 20 years later,” McEniff added. “That was a first for the county and Bonar's goal was the sealer.

“We had a fairly experienced team with Pauric McShea, Anton Carroll, Frankie McFeely, myself, Donal Monaghan, Seamus Bonar RIP, Alan Kane RIP, Declan Carroll, Seamie Granaghan and the late Joe Winston and Mickey McMenamin”.

When asked how he felt at the final whistle, he said: “My feeling was one of total elation and I actually saw grown men cry on that wet day in Clones, great GAA men who had been supporting Donegal a lifetime. It was great, and we toured the county with the cup for the first team and it was a great time. I remember going into Jackson's Hotel and Joe Jackson was there and he said: ‘Congratulations young McEniff, where are you going?’

“I said we are going on a tour of the county, and he put his hand in the till and took out a pile of notes and he said 'I am going with youse.'

“He came out to the car and plonked himself in the front seat beside me as I was driving, and we finished up that night in Gweedore on a tour. I don't know how Joe Jackson got back but on the way back Seamie Granaghan was in the back of the car and he was the milkman in Bundoran and Alan Kane, who was a mechanic and who had to go back to work and myself and Pauric McShea and the late Francie Carroll who was going for an interview for the bank in Sligo.

“This was late on Monday night and outside Glenties on the way back the car broke down and it was serious as Alan Kane was not able to fix it. This was 3:30 in the morning and we sat on the side of the road until 5:30am when Jimmy McKelvey from Glenties was driving a County Council lorry, so we all got up on the back and we went into Mrs Hyland in Donegal Town - Pauric McShea is married to her daughter Brídín and she gave us all breakfast.

“And all she had was a wee mini car and the five of us piled into the mini car and she left us home. This was Tuesday morning and I arrived in the house with a three days beard and a bag of gear and the cup. My wife Cautie met me at the door …”