GAELIC GAMES: KEITH DUGGANprofiles Marty Clarke, who has made a huge impact since returning to the Down colours following his three-year exile in Australia
ON CLEAR days it can be seen for miles – a huge black and red flag, planted on the summit of Knockshee. They woke up one morning and there it was, unmistakable on the skyline.
It came from nowhere overnight, much like the Down football team it salutes. They can see it some three miles away in Carlingford and it can be seen on the other side of the Mourne Mountains too, on Cranford beach where Martin Clarke grew up.
Marty – even in a county where football jewels are plentiful, they speak about him in awed terms. It would be unfair on Clarke and unfair on his Down team-mates to attribute their revival to the return of the Kilkeel man. But rarely has a player made such an instant and devastating contribution to the fortunes of a team.
All of the promise Clarke showed as a teenager disappeared when he accepted an invitation to swap life lighting up the gorgeous peninsula for the uncertain lot of an apprentice football player in Collingwood, Melbourne.
This summer, all of that talent and creativity has come flooding back with his return to Down colours. Clarke’s three years in exile would appear to have done nothing but improve his facility as a Gaelic football player and just like that, he is at the epicentre of a Down forward unit shimmering with the traditional qualities: speed, imagination and a menacing, goal-hungry way about them.
Clarke has that slouch-shouldered athleticism that makes his game seem all the more casual and he has mastered the deceptive habit of seeming to drift into plays in order to make the definitive pass.
Conor Deegan, Down’s outstanding full back from yesteryear noticed just that quality when he spoke about Clarke recently.
“In today’s game, that work is incredibly important. Marty is the benefactor of all this hard work. I am not saying that he does not do it himself, but every time you get a ball, you are looking for Marty Clarke because he is there. He always gets to where the ball is.
“In a lot of ways, he is very like the way Greg Blaney used to be for us. Greg was like that, he was the fulcrum of everything. He got his hands on the ball, people looked for him. Marty has probably a bit more guile to his game than the likes of Greg did but in a lot of ways, they are similar.
“If you look at (Brian) McGuigan, he is probably the other one who has that vision as well but I think Marty’s left foot adds something else. He is just a little bit different and left-footers always have more time than anyone else on the ball.
“I don’t know why that is and nobody has ever explained it to me, but they are able to drift out, get on to the left side. Marty’s vision is exemplary and that is the thing that really sets him apart.
“The pass he made for (Peter) Fitzpatrick, he knew that move was on before he got the ball and as soon as he got the ball it was, bang. He just knows what is happening. He is just a very instinctive, very talented young fellow.”
It was ever so. For a while, people must have feared he was going to become the best Down forward that never was. He was the conductor in the Down minor team that won the All-Ireland championship in 2005, the year he led his school team St Louis Grammar School to the first of two improbable MacRory Cup finals.
“I wouldn’t have had the brains for that there!” laughs Michael McVeigh Down’s senior goalkeeper and a club-mate of Clarke’s with An Ríocht, when asked if he had attended the same school.
“No, but I watched Marty in a few of those games. I was at work one of the days and I skived off because it was my first time to see him play for the school. And he scored seven or eight points and won the game for them.”
Clarke’s perfor-mance in the drawn final in Casement Park was the beginning of his lightning conversion to Australian Rules football.
Australian scouts attending the game as part of that year’s under-17 International Rules tour were alerted to Clarke’s athleticism and his uncanny vision.
By July of 2006, the teenager was in pre-season camp in Melbourne. Because Australian Rules commands such limited interest here, what Clarke achieved in the professional game went unnoticed. But his progress was remarkable.
Early in his apprenticeship, Clarke predicted that he would spend a couple of years learning his trade in the reserve league.
“To suggest I would be able to play at the top level after I hardly knew what Australian Rules was this time last year is asking a lot,” he observed at the time.
But he did just that. He made a masterly debut in June of 2007, against the Sydney Swans and in front of a crowd of 65,000 people.
The Australian press swooned about the speed with which he adapted to the native game and, as with his Gaelic games, Clarke’s performances often seemed embellished with off-the-cuff moments of instinctive brilliance.
That autumn, on a break from Collingwood, Clarke played centre-forward for An Ríocht and scored two goals when they won the Down Division One title.
It must have been tantalising for Down football people, a vivid reminder of what they almost had – and during a period when Down football seemed like something of a lost cause at senior level.
“Any time you looked at Martin kicking a ball, even playing soccer, you knew he was special,” McVeigh says. “He was a class act. Now, every time he pulls on the jersey at home, he looks more and more like the fella that went away – but with more bulk. When Marty went to Australia, you did get some people saying, ‘ah he should be staying’. But you have to respect a man’s decision. I was behind him.
“Me and John went over to see him play a few games and it was great to see him play. I followed him big time. He is bigger and stronger and he went away a boy and has become a man.”
It could be that just experiencing the life of a professional athlete was enough to satisfy Clarke’s curiosity. He had a habit of writing N.I. – for Northern Ireland or HM for home on his forearm when he played in Australia’s raucous football theatres and made the long flight home whenever he had the chance.
In 2007 he took part in a BBC documentary and standing under the floodlights in Páirc Esler in Newry he revealed the conflict between his home sport and adopted sport. This was just a few minutes after An Ríocht had won their title and the emotional pull would have been intense.
“I am definitely a bit rusty yet and I am going to need to brush up a bit if I am going to come back and play. This means more to me – I am not going to say it means more than what Collingwood does. . . och, I’ll just come out and say it: An Ríocht means more to me than over in Australia at the minute. This is my club and family. It means so much.”
Maybe even then the realisation was forming in Clarke’s mind he would not be committing himself to the Australian Rules life as Jim Stynes had done before him. A rough season in 2008, where injuries curtailed his appearances and the persistent desire to resume his Gaelic football career made the decision to decline Collingwood’s offer of a three-year extension relatively straightforward.
Clarke’s decision to walk way from Australian Rules having already passed with flying colours the toughest task – mastering the oval ball – was surely the most eloquent answer to GAA fears about the professional sport thieving the best Gaelic football players. Clarke was already an exception in that he was an Irish apprentice who made the grade.
And yet he walked away because of the magnetic draw of his first sport. His return to Down coincided with the appointment of James McCartan, talisman of the 1990s, as the county senior manager. Serendipity was at play. When McCartan was asked about Clarke at Down’s press afternoon last week, he responded. “The guy is home from Australia and he has been fantastic for us. He is a fantastic individual.
“He is a quiet guy who just wants to get on with his football and there is no doubt that he, among some of these guys at the top table, has helped transform Down’s fortunes. We are delighted to have him . . . .”
His reintegration to the Down football scene has gone perfectly. Clarke’s Australian adventure has done nothing but improve his game. Unlike most elite Gaelic footballers, who attempt to emulate the lives of professional athletes, Clarke actually lived that life for two full years and is now reaping the benefits of it. At 22, he is perfectly poised for a long career in the red and black.
The first, brief chapter of Clarke’s football life was one of glittering accomplishment but this time last year, few would have banked on him challenging for the major honour in the game this September. Little wonder they are shielding him.
The last thing Clarke would want is the suggestion his return has transformed Down from a stuttering Ulster force to All-Ireland dark horses.
“Media-wise, that is an easy one to jump on to,” Conor Deegan cautions. “He is a very stylish player, he runs around, his socks are up, he looks the part and he plays the part as well. But I think a lot of the hard work is being done around him. That is why Down have now struck a great chord. They now realise the boys work hard, we move the ball at pace, we offload at the right time.
“The decision-making has improved dramatically and while Marty has been central to that and people are rightly saying what a great player he is, it has been more of a team thing than saying it has been mainly down to one individual.”
Still, around Mourne country, they are glad to have him back.
It is one thousand feet to the top of Knockshee. You don’t climb that hill with a Down flag on your back without good reason.
Walking in my shoes Down's playmakers in All-Ireland finals
1960, 1961 – James McCartan Senior: Powerful and direct, McCartan was voted footballer of the year after Down’s first two All-Ireland titles. His brother Dan was centre back. Asked why the Down team of the 1960s are remembered so fondly, McCartan said: “We were the first team to bring the Sam Maguire over the border and number two, we had six forwards and any one of them could win a match.” On September 26th, 1960, Paddy Downey wrote: “Jim McCartan was again the ruling force in a grand lot of forwards where every man of the six blended perfectly – real championship side!”
1968 – Paddy Doherty: Played at left half forward on Down’s previous winning teams. The Ballykinlar man might have been lost to English football, having signed for Lincoln City and was suspended by the GAA for playing with an Irish League side. But he was an integral part of the Down revolution. Noted as a superb marksman from distance, he had a sublime left-foot game and is considered one of the best half forwards to have played the game. On September 23rd, 1968, Paddy Downey wrote: “With Doherty falling back frequently to make a third man in the middle, the winners’ attack was enabled to move through in full spate. For the spectators, it was a glorious sight to see them in action; for the hesitant Kerry defence, it was a hideous experience.”
1991, 1994 – Greg Blaney: The dentist who froze centre backs. Skinny as a whippet and hard as nails, the Carryduff man had it all. His father was captain of the Armagh team that won the minor All-Ireland in 1949, but Blaney was pure black and red. Played on the 1979 Down U-21 team that won the All-Ireland at just 16 and won his first Ulster medal at age 18. He had to wait a further decade for All-Ireland glory, by which time he had established himself as one of the most brilliant playmakers in the modern game. On September 19th, 1994, Paddy Downey wrote: “The Down attack almost overwhelmed the Dublin backs in the first half, with the old general Greg Blaney guiding operations with crafty moves on the 40.”
