Johnny
Corcoran is a truly remarkable character. From Finglas to Castleknock,
via Leixlip, he has immersed himself in the GAA. Johnny is a proud
Erin’s Isle man who was involved in the iconic Dublin squad of the 70s,
commonly known as ‘Heffo’s Army’.
His
enthusiasm for the game stemmed from his love for Erin’s Isle. There
was a fantastic mix of characters within the club in the early 70s.
“Every county in Ireland was represented where we lived,” recalls a
nostalgic Johnny. Finglas East has produced many notable Dublin GAA
stalwarts. John Costello, Paddy Canning, and Mick Seavers, who are all
vital county board members, lived in the same neighbourhood as Johnny.
It
is fair to say that Heffo encouraged the love Johnny had developed for
the GAA. Johnny is adamant that you should always play for your local
club. He married and moved to Leixlip where he joined his local GAA
club, engulfing himself within the local community. When he moved to
Castleknock in 1996, it was no different. The only challenge was that
there was no GAA club in his local area to join. Johnny knew this issue
must be addressed.
St
Patrick’s Day 1998: Johnny’s hometown club Erin’s Isle lose out to
Corofin by five points in the All Ireland Football Club Championship.
However, thoughts turned from Erin’s Isle of Finglas to a potential new
club in Castleknock. Johnny raised the thought with the late John Egan,
who was county chairman at the time. John Egan attended Beneavin College
in Finglas, a school with a strong GAA ethos. He was fully supportive
of Johnny’s plans. John Costello, county secretary at the time, also
committed to supporting the venture of creating a GAA club in
Castleknock.
Johnny
explains why he wanted to start a new club. “The love of the game is
what drove us to start something from scratch. It’s all about the
promotion of hurling and football. I saw, first-hand, in Finglas East
and Leixlip what a GAA club can do for the area. The community spirit it
brings into the place is amazing. Between 1985 and 1998, there were an
awful lot of houses built in Castleknock; the population exploded.
We
came in at the right time. The Celtic Tiger era came after so even more
houses appeared then. We were able to capitalise on that; there was a
bit of luck involved too.”
Johnny
initially got the plan in motion. Fergus Hamill, a friend of Johnny’s
and a teacher in Castleknock, became involved after John Egan had
mentioned it to the Monaghan native. Fergus, at first, was slightly
apprehensive about the idea. He eventually became the first chairman of
the club. Johnny, although a humble man, was focused, driven, and
extremely intent on succeeding with the Castleknock GAA project.
“You
have to be on the edge all of the time. I was going around telling
people white lies. I asked Fergus would he come to a meeting if we got a
group of people involved. But at the time I had no one else, there was
only me.”
Johnny
was cunning in how he went about organising support. His resilience
paid off in the form of luck on many occasions. “My third son, Rory, was
in Francis Xavier School and there was a man there, John O’Brien, who
would take the class out a few evenings every week and play football in
the field under the lights from the shopping centre. The lights were
shining onto the school and that’s how they first started with GAA.”
John
O’Brien didn’t have a big GAA background but his enthusiasm was what
drew Johnny to him. John agreed to support the plan of creating a
Castleknock GAA team. That group of school children formed the first
juvenile team for the club at under 10 level.
John
was part of a small group that held their first meeting upstairs in
Myos pub, in Castleknock. Another man associated with Erin’s Isle, John
Conway, was an integral part of that meeting. He was good friends with
John Costello, as they grew up together. Plans were coming together for
Castleknock GAA club. Suddenly, they had a chairman and secretary agreed
on, Fergus Hamill and John Conway, respectively. It became a bit of an
obsession for Johnny as he put all of his spare time into the project.
But that’s what was needed.
The
group agreed to meet once a week, in order to build up regularity. From
the outset, they organised professional meetings; minutes of the
meetings were taken. Although they were not officially a club yet, they
were doing things right.
“From
the start we could see Castleknock was a great name. Everyone knows
Castleknock as a nice area which would be good for sponsorship. We were
putting Castleknock on the map. It was never associated with the GAA,
until we came along.”
“The
essence of the GAA is localism. You want local rivalry. The area around
Castleknock is a hotbed for the GAA. If you come up the Navan Road,
there is a GAA club in every parish. You have St Finbarrs, Oliver
Plunketts, St Brigids, and if you keep travelling up that road you’re
met with a club in Clonee and a club in Dunboyne. They may be in a
bordering county but they’re still the next parishes.
If you go west, then you’ve now got Castleknock, St Peregrines, Tyrrelstown, Westmanstown Gaels, Lucan Sarsfields, and Confey.”
Castleknock
also had a struggle competing for grounds. In April and September of
1998, there was a desperate rush to obtain grounds to play on. They
received a green in a housing estate to use as a juvenile pitch.
“We
could only put up temporary posts as the local residents didn’t want us
using it as a permanent pitch. We were happy to agree to that. We knew
beggars couldn’t be choosers. We went up every Saturday morning and
dragged steal posts up. We had to put them up and take them down during
the week too if there was a match. It was hard going but it was great
fun.”
Their
home ground was affectionately known as Tir Na nOg. In early July of
that year, before official approval was granted, they had begun
training. Twenty five children showed up for their first session on a
beautifully sunny Saturday morning. A week later, they were officially
granted approval.
Castleknock
entered three juvenile teams at under 9, under 10, and under 11.
Approval was needed by July in order for all paperwork to be submitted
and approved for the start of the leagues in September. However, there
were still some stumbling blocks along the way.
“If
we hadn’t of been approved when we were, just before the deadline, we
may have folded,” admits Johnny.
He goes on to say, “at certain stages,
we were very worried because the county board only meet once a month. We
were working hourly. Big wheels move slowly. However, it all worked out
in the end. We even entered an adult football team for the start of the
season. So now we had to search for an adult pitch.”
The
county council provided Castleknock with a pitch in Porterstown and it
all took off from there. Within eight Saturdays they had 100 children
playing for the club.
They
hounded local schools for support. Johnny recognises the support
Castleknock Community College gave to the new club. Their principal
wrote a letter which Johnny produced to the county board and local
politicians in order to entice them to support the club.
Johnny
elaborates on how funds were raised in order to give momentum to the
project. “The local pubs were much busier than they are now. We used to
be down there every night of the week gathering support. We got
everything from them. They really were so supportive. They gave us cash
when it was needed in order to buy anything for the club. We organised
functions. Mick Lynch, a great man from Cavan, organised two golf
classics in the one year with 50 teams in each. That’s a great bit of
money raised. It was tough, but we got there.”
At
their second meeting, they created a membership scheme. They all
decided to give €20 each. The thinking behind this was that if 20 people
gave €20 then that €400 could be used to purchase a set of jerseys.
Johnny was overwhelmed with the support the club received at the start.
“The local T.Ds were great - Joan Burton and the late Brian Lenihan –
but so too were all of the local councillors.”
Castleknock
were beginning to progress as a club. A year after their inception,
they entered a junior hurling team. At times Johnny and the chairman,
Fergus Hamill, often found themselves playing for the adult teams in
order to fulfil the numbers needed.
“We
adopted the mindset from the start which was to never give a walkover.
I’d be very upset if we gave a team a walkover, even if it meant lads
playing two or three times per weekend. That is how we aimed to get
ourselves a good name in the county board. We never withdrew teams. Even
if we were beaten, at least we fielded a team and fulfilled the
fixture. We insisted on developing a good name that way.”
As
the years progressed, Castleknock further improved as a club. In 2007
they won an All Ireland Division One hurling Feile. It was an
extraordinary achievement for a club who were in existence for less than
ten years. The Feile was held in Kilkenny. None of the country teams
had even heard of Castleknock GAA Club. They were astonished that a
relatively new Dublin club, whose facilities consisted of a council
pitch and a container as a makeshift dressing room, were playing at this
level. Castleknock beat Ahane of Limerick in the final. Brian Cody gave
a pre-match talk to the team as he helped mentor the teams who had
knocked out the local Kilkenny teams from the competition.
- Members of Castleknock GAA Club during the Feile na nGael Atha Cliath parade in 2012
Confidence
was extremely high in the club after that victory. The adult teams were
gaining promotions and are now playing at very respectable levels in
Division 2 football and Division 3 hurling. The Feile win in 2007 was
the juvenile highlight for Johnny, and he admits it would be “very hard
to beat that feeling of winning our first national juvenile
competition.” However, progress can be seen at all levels in the club.
“Two
years ago, we won the Junior A Dublin Championship in football which
was brilliant. Kenmare beat us in the All Ireland Junior A semi-final
which was disappointing, but it was a great achievement to reach that
stage. Last year, we won the Junior A Dublin Championship in hurling.
The hurlers will be hoping for promotion this year, but there’s no
pressure on them. They’re a very young team.”
Castleknock
are currently fielding three adult football and hurling teams. On
average, there are 170 children who attend the nursery level in the club
on a Saturday morning. According to Johnny, there are around 1,000
members in the club with a big emphasis put on family membership. There
are an estimated 600 families involved with the club. The team who won
the All Ireland hurling Feile achieved more success at minor level when
they won the Dublin minor A football Championship. Competing at the top
level has occurred for Castleknock, now they must strive to maintain
that level of success.
- Castleknock and Dublin star forward, Ciaran Kilkenny
When
one talks about the current state Castleknock find themselves in, the
name Ciaran Kilkenny must be mentioned. In Johnny’s opinion, Ciaran was
“the best bit of talent in Dublin at under 14 level up to minor both in
football and hurling.” He goes on to state that: “his talent was evident
since the cradle. The impact he has had in promoting Castleknock has
been huge; he’s a genuinely nice lad which helps the cause too.
The
saga about him going to Australia and returning was mind-blowing for
us. A few people had a quiet word trying to convince him to stay, for
the good of his future career, but you can only say that to a certain
extent. He’s an all round fantastic sportsman; he’s a brilliant tennis
player too. His recent injury is not only a huge blow to him, but to
everyone involved with Dublin GAA. I wish him all the best in his
recovery.”
Overall
Johnny is proud of the progress that Castleknock have made. “It was
such a huge challenge at the start to get the club on firm footing and
not just be temporary.
A
lot of people involved with other clubs in Dublin saw us as a temporary
idea at the start, especially when we were first looking for pitches.
We were offered pitches on Dunsink dump and the joke was that
Castleknock were going to get pitches with underground heating! A
councillor actually came back to us with that idea. But that would have
killed us; we aimed for everything to be local.”
Castleknock is now a distinct GAA area thanks to work Johnny and many others have put in.
“It’s
been tough going at times, you have to be really focused. You have to
be prepared to go beyond the call of duty sometimes. It takes up all of
your spare time, but that’s how the GAA thrives. I was on talking terms
with every chairman in the county, and we get on really well with other
clubs. For me personally, in a sporting context, Castleknock GAA means
everything to me. We’re promoting the games that we should be familiar
with. It’s great for the community ultimately. When you put so much into
it, it’s fantastic to see so much come out of it. You’d be a bit
disappointed if it hadn’t reached the levels you intended, but at the
moment we’re exceeding all expectations.”
Johnny recalls one of his most recent happy memories associated with Castleknock.
“One
of the biggest matches this year, in a way the biggest adult football
match we ever played, was against our local rivals St Brigids. We had to
win in order to gain promotion to Division 2. The match was scheduled
for the Sunday. On the previous Friday night, we had to beat Whitehall
Colmcille’s in order to get to that position which was very tough.
Beating Whitehall was our best ever win in terms of the standard of
football, as Whitehall play in the senior championship. We brought a
huge crowd down to St Brigids that Sunday and we came away victorious.
But we were all welcomed in the clubhouse afterwards with absolutely no
animosity.”
Indeed
there has been a great amount of work put into Castleknock GAA Club but
there are miles to go before they sleep. They recently acquired grounds
beside the Castleknock Hotel where they now have fantastic playing
facilities. Building work on a clubhouse should begin this summer.
Johnny is aware though that they must keep progressing as a club.
“If
we think everything is rosy then that’s the rock you perish on. You
have to keep working hard and see where that takes you. But generally,
it’s been brilliant. I can’t wait to look back on all the brilliant work
we’ve achieved when our 20th anniversary comes around in 2018.”
With
his welcoming mannerisms, unique Finglas humour, and his honest toil,
it’s clear to see why Johnny Corcoran has been so beneficial to
Castleknock GAA Club.
There
has been a core group of men working relentlessly on behalf of
Castleknock since its inception in 1998. It’s these people that are the
life and soul of the GAA.
They
are the true patrons of the game. They represent the tireless volunteer
work which the GAA embodies. It’s people like Johnny Corcoran that make
it possible for Dublin GAA to achieve success at the highest level of
the sport.
But for players rising through the ranks of Castleknock GAA club, it would be advisable to follow Johnny’s mantra.
“Castleknock
should be people’s main aim. You have to start at the grassroots and if
you’re good enough, Dublin will come calling. But the parish comes
first!”
S.DAWSON 11/04/14