Last Saturday was a busy day around Dunderry.First of all the village was packed in the morning with the attendees at the Church for First Holy Communion for the pupils of Dunderry School.Great occasion all round I heard.I think that there were 15 Communicants, the girls vastly outnumbering the boys.Phil's daughter had the choir in great voice and Finn's woman tickled the ivory with erudition and an impressive induction to the Body of Christ was experienced by the participating children on their big day out.
Take a bow the teachers of Dunderry and the parents involved.
And I am sure all had a day to remember.
I had a clash of fixtures at 1.00 p.m.
My granddaughter Kate Kelly (Claire's daughter ) was a year old and a party was kicking off at 1.00,the same time as the game.
I am a brave man but not brave enough to miss a party of this kind.Henpecked,chicken pecked and egg pecked you could say.
Party it was so.
I have a particular reason to be interested in the under 14 football team.It stems for profound concern at the inexorable slide of our juvenile footballer down the Divisions this last decade and the need for urgent redeemable action to reverse it.
A decade ago we were Div.1/2 minor football .This year we are Div.5.At under 16 level we are Div.5 also and so it goes.
I was appalled last year at the lax attitude towards sliding standards and the galling lack of respect amongst certain mid teens towards the Club and had courted unpopularity by repeatedly saying so.
There is no genetic reason why standards should have slipped so drastically and efforts and personnel are now in place to arrest the decline.
A win in this Final would go a long way to starting the climb back to respectability and ensure that we don't take our eyes off the sporting ball again ,as it were.
I had a reporter there to fill me in.
Firstly the pedigree of the team management are impeccable.Sean Kelly has more coaching qualifications than would sink a battleship.He also happens to be a Meath selector.John Brady ,like Sean played at all levels for Meath and is a fanatic Club man.Eoin O Leary,from the Lambay corner of the Parish is a fanatic Gael and is married to one also as are the others.
And they all have skin in the game.
All the players are with the team since they were 8 years old,all are from solid GAA families and barring there are profound sporting genetic deficiencies in some of them and given the pedigree of the management the sky ought be the limit.
And thanks be to God it was.
They won a hard sporting and fiercely contested match by 5-10 to 4-10.The result was in doubt right up to the final whistle.
Warriors were.
James Smyth
Jack Feeney Ronan Brady
Diarmuid O Corrain Donagh O laoire Michael Garry
Cian Eglington Shane Heffernan
Conor Leavy Dermot Kelly Cormack Brady
Alex Smyth Adam Kelly
Subs used.Paul Maxwell and Luke Hill.
I am told it was more an overall team effort than a display by just a few talented individuals and this is as it should be.
In the opinion of one man ,and remember everyone has a personal opinion,Ronan Brady,Donagh O Laoire,Shane Heffernan,Dermot Kelly,Adam Kelly and Diarmuid O Corrain made the more significant contributions ,just about,towards the lifting of the laurel,but in reality it was a super all round team effort.
I pray that this is the start of the fightback towards football respectability at this level .It is certainly a start.
Let us face it,the management team would not be out of place at senior Inter County evel and if the players didn't take encouragement from such a set up it's all a matter.
The good ship Dunderry Juvenile football has successfully cleared the harbour mouth but is now sailing into more testing waters.
We will be keeping an eye on its progress.
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