Minor irritation nagged at Cavan legend for decades

Cavanman's Diary

In the week that the footballers of Cornafean won a Division 3 All-County League title, it might be apt to recall an old interview on the RTÉ archives, which recently stopped me in my tracks. I’m not sure how I hadn’t heard it before – it was with Big Tom O’Reilly, the chieftain of Cavan football when the county was a powerhouse of the game, being interviewed by Jimmy Magee on RTÉ Radio 60 years ago, in March 1966.

The caption underneath states that the clip was “possibly recorded for a programme or segment of programme titled ‘Where Are They Now?’”, which for some reason added to the charm of the piece, and the allure.

I knew that Big Tom was iconic in every sense – “Big Tom is dead”, began his obituary - but hearing his voice was affecting: the mythological figure made man.

He comes across as genial but authoritative, well-spoken but retaining his Cavan accent. Asked about the greatest team he had seen, he didn’t hesitate.

“Well, I’d have to say the Cavan team of ’47. Not because they were from Cavan, but because they were just a great team,” he said.

“They had that thing that it takes to make teams great. Wonderful combination of teamwork and great players.”

This chimed with something the late Johnny Cusack, an All-Ireland winner in 1952, told me once in an interview; he met Tom and asked him what the greatest Cavan team was. The response was that the ‘47 team were the best, each of the forwards a deadly scoring threat.

Magee then asked an interesting question.

“A lot of people said that football way back in the late 30s or early 40s was much rougher and tougher than it is today. Is this true?”

“I reckon that is true,” replied Tom.

“When I started it was tougher up until ’37. It got easier after that because the men that played it were fitter, I reckon. They lived for playing football and they’d done nothing else only played football and worked hard. It made them tougher.”

1937, of course, was the year in which Cavan lost an All-Ireland final replay to Kerry, whom Cavan felt brutalised them, with captain Jim Smith ending up in hospital with a litany of injuries which, at this remove, seem almost comic.

(Smith was quoted in this newspaper, speaking from his hospital bed, saying: “I received all these injuries within 10 minutes of the start. First, I got a blow on the back of the head, leaving a lump. Then both my eyes were damaged, and then a few minutes later my lips and teeth were broken. A short time later, a fifth blow to the face smashed my nose. I cannot breathe through my nose today.”)

So, it seems the game was cleaned up a little after that. Magee then asked O’Reilly a question which probably wouldn’t be posed today.

“When you started playing senior in 1933, you were a six-footer at 17, about 14 and a half stone. Would you like to tell us your weight now?”

“My weight now is 15 stone 10… I try to keep fit. I play a bit of golf.”

Ahead of his time, he wished for a day when young people could play whatever sport they wanted instead of being restricted by the Ban.

GREATEST DISAPPOINTMENT

The question that interested me most, however, was his greatest disappointment.

I expected him to mention one of the senior defeats. Perhaps an Ulster final, perhaps one of the All-Ireland campaigns that fell short. Instead, Big Tom went back more than 30 years.”My biggest disappointment was losing a minor Ulster final,” he said.

“It was about 1932 and we were leading eight to two with about five minutes to go. We got beaten by two goals scored by the Antrim fellas and a point.

“How did they manage to do this? Did you slacken up?” asked Magee.

“Slackened up and one goal was scored from a 50 and the other one, the full-back let it slip through his hands and it dropped in.

“And they got a free then. We got excited, lost our heads and got excited and they got a free and that was the winning point for them.”

“Now, would you have sooner won that minor medal than the senior medal, or both?

“I’d like to have won both, but I was very disappointed over the minor one. I always thought we could have won the All -Ireland that year,” he said, his tone not changing.

I couldn’t recall hearing about such a collapse in an Ulster final; Cavan’s record at minor level has generally been poor, even when the county was dominating Ulster otherwise, and it didn’t ring a bell.

I dug into the archives of this newspaper and it turned out, the match he was referring to was an Ulster semi-final.

The contemporary report tells a remarkable story, Cavan led by 2-2 to 0-2 at half-time, Dick Reilly of Stradone scoring both goals. The paper described the 15-year-old St Patrick’s College student as Cavan’s star performer.

Then came the collapse. Antrim, described as “much the heavier side”, took control after the break. McCann scored twice, McWilliams added another point and suddenly Cavan’s commanding lead was under threat.

As Big Tom remembered, panic set in.

The report noted that Cavan “made a noble effort to save the game” in the closing stages but Antrim survived a fierce onslaught before the final whistle sounded with the Saffrons victorious by a single point.

The previous week, in the preview, the writer had confidently predicted that “the Cavan lads are a reliable lot and should come out on top”.

Big Tom wasn’t exaggerating, I’m guessing, when he told Jimmy Magee that he believed they could have won the All-Ireland.

While he gilded his legend in the years that followed, the great Cornafean man never forgot the disappointment of that afternoon. He carried the regret for 30 years and, presumably, 30 more afterwards before his passing at the age of 80 in 1995.

Big Tom O’Reilly was a household name in Ireland, had successfully contested a General Election and was regarded as one of the greats of Gaelic football.

It says something, I think, about how disappointments in youth leave deeper scars that he was still sore over that minor defeat.