Richard Fitzpatricktalks to some old boys who are now coaching at the school after excelling for Clare
ST FLANNAN’S is the diocesan college for Killaloe. Located on the entrance into Ennis from the Limerick side, it is an impressive sight. Complete with a clock tower and gothic windows, its main building rests foursquare amid a couple of acres of playing pitches and a set of old concrete handball alleys where the likes of Len Gaynor, Joe McKenna and Ger Loughnane honed their hurling skills as boarders.
“The new thing now is that guys play ‘doors’,” says Mike McInerney, one of the school’s hurling team coaches, matter-of-factly. “They’ve manufactured their own game. There are two doors in the front of the handball alleys. So you’ve three shots and you’ve to hit three doors and then the next fella comes along and he has to hit three doors and if they’re equal, there’s a play-off between the two of them.
“Handball with hurleys is another. You’re allowed to let the ball bounce once and then you’ve to hit it.
“That’s what they do just after half eight in the morning when the buses start coming in. That’s what they do at lunchtime. That’s still there; it’s good to see.”
They’ve always liked their stick games at St Flannan’s. Cricket was originally the most popular game in the school, but with the ferment of the Gaelic revival at the turn of the 19th century, hurling began to take hold among the student population. The sport has thrived since.
This year, 64 or 65 first-year students took to the fields at the start of the year for trials. The school’s senior team still train three or four evenings a week. The same as it did 20, 40 and 60 years ago. It has quite a tradition to uphold.
The college is the most garlanded hurling school in Munster. As a measure of its dominance, it reached eight Dr Harty Cup (senior) finals over one recent 12-year stretch. Once outside the province, St Kieran’s College (Kilkenny) is “the benchmark”.
Jamesie O’Connor, hurler of the year in 1997 and a member of staff, recalls losing the 1989 All-Ireland Colleges final to the Kilkenny outfit in 1989. O’Connor had a goal disallowed just before the final whistle, which would have won St Flannan’s the match; while at the other end of the pitch, DJ Carey looted the full-back line for 3-3 of his side’s 3-5.
“We thought we’d take Tommy Walsh another day – that he’d be a weak, little fella in the full-back line. History records it differently,” says McInerney.
The painful defeats are dredged up quicker, a measure perhaps of the school’s exacting standards; although there have been imperious days, too.
In the 1998 All-Ireland Colleges final, played at Croke Park, St Flannan’s were five points down with “minutes to go” but prevailed by five points. Andrew Quinn and Cathal O’Reilly scored two late goals. Famously, a substitute slip had been written for O’Reilly, but he ended the game with 1-2.
Owing to demographic changes, former rivals such as Farranferris, North Mon and Midleton have been replaced by schools such as Waterford’s De La Salle and Ardscoil Rís down the road in Limerick. In fact, Ardscoil Rís pulls many of its students from former catchment areas for St Flannan’s such as Cratloe and Sixmilebridge. Meanwhile the new bypass motorway outside Newmarket-on-Fergus – where former Government minister Michael D Higgins, a past-pupil, grew up – means that many of its children are now brought to neighbouring schools in Shannon instead of to St Flannan’s.
The demise of its boarding regime – which ceased at the turn of the millennium – has altered the feel of the school also.
There is a lighter touch about the college these days, compared to the Spartan regime that many of its older past pupils recall; although, naturally, it means that some of the life and energy of the place has dissipated. Gone is the hurling shed, for example, where boarders would congregate to repair hurleys and chew the fat.
“The Dermot Gleesons, the Séamus Hickeys, the Turlough Herberts . . . they were great characters around the school for hurling because they were here 24/7.
“Jamesie and these made a huge contribution too obviously,” says John Minogue, a current mentor and a niggardly corner back with the Clare senior hurlers in the 1980s, gesturing towards O’Connor who attended as a day pupil, “but these were often very strong characters because they lived on site; they hurled on site. They ate and drank hurling. I think you miss those.”
“Going back 25 years ago or longer,” says O’Connor, “there were first year leagues, second and third year leagues played. When you had 150 boarders, the majority of them in the evenings were togging out.”
“It was a great way for crowd control,” adds Minogue, as his two colleagues crease up in laughter. “You sent them up the field after school. Then they were hungry. Then they ate. Then there was study; then prayer. Then they could sleep.”
St Flannan's Factfile
School: St Flannans College, Limerick Road, Ennis, Co Clare.
Founded: 1881.
Number of pupils:1,151 (girls, who were admitted in first year in 2002, make up a third of the student population).
Sports played:Athletics, basketball, camogie, Gaelic football, golf, horse riding, hurling, women's football, rugby, soccer, tennis.
Senior hurling titles:14 Dr Croke Cups (All-Ireland Colleges), 21 Dr Harty Cups (Munster Colleges).
Notable hurling past pupils: Jimmy Smyth, Jim Kennedy, Len Gaynor, Ger Loughnane, Joe McKenna, Anthony Daly, Davy Fitzgerald, Tony Griffin.
Most surprising senior hurling talent:"Ollie Baker was struggling here as a Harty player," says John Minogue. "He was a big, gangly, raw hurler at 16, 17, but then he blossomed. Once Ollie hit 20, he took off."
Notable past pupils (non-sport):Tomás MacGiolla, Bishop Willie Walsh, Michael O'Kennedy, Michael D Higgins.
Inside Track Feargus Ryan
Age:18.
Assessment of new Dublin manager, Anthony Daly, who trained him at club under-21 level: "He doesn't leave anything untouched. He works everything out to a tee – what time you're on the field, warm-ups . . . everything is thought out. He's a great man to motivate. He'd tear down the wall, having you ready to go."
Hurling heroes:"Henry Shefflin, and I suppose Jamesie (O'Connor) and Con (Woods)," he says, tongue protruding from the side of his cheek, about the school's Harty Cup team trainers.
Other sporting hero:Roy Keane because of "his drive".
Highlight of hurling career:"Achievements are a bit sparse. I was a panellist on the Dean Ryan-winning team in 2005. Hopefully this year, we'll be 2009 Harty Cup and All-Ireland Colleges champions!"
Play any other sports?Winger on Ennis under-18 rugby club team.
