KIERAN McCARTHY caught up with three members of the trailblazing Rossa hurlers – captain Flor Crowley, Alan Foley and Rob Long – to chat about their historic 2004 county junior B hurling triumph
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ALAN Foley’s blue Ford Fiesta van is the stuff of hurling legend in Skibbereen.
When he first arrived in the West Cork town in late October 1996, he explored his new home on a Suzuki 100 he bought from a good friend, Padge Hayes of Tragumna. That’s what Foley, freshly qualified as a teacher from Mary I earlier that year, used to get around. His uncle Jerh decided it was safer to put the van under Foley, so the Fiesta set off on its next road trip.
The new teacher in Skibb would ferry lads to O’Donovan Rossa hurling training, six or seven bouncing around in the back, jostling with hurleys for room. There were legendary spins out to Ballyhilty Bridge, its arches stretching over the River Ilen, when noises from the chaos behind urged him to drop the gears and let fly.
Like the O’Donovan Rossa hurlers in their incredible 2004 season, the Fiesta soared high.
‘The van was hurling folklore with the young lads,’ Foley laughs, ‘but I had to move on eventually.’
The Ford Fiesta van is long gone, but just like the Skibbereen’s hurlers and their incredible 2004 season, its legend lives on.
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‘The heartbreak has bound us together because we must be the only junior B team still celebrating winning a county title 20 years on,’ quips Flor Crowley, captain of the trailblazing Rossa hurlers that went on to hit heights no hurling team from the club had ever reached before.
The backstory offers context. The Skibb hurlers had lost three West Cork finals in six seasons before their stuff-of-dreams ’04 odyssey. St Oliver Plunkett’s (1997), Randal Óg (2000) and St Colum’s (2003) all dashed Rossa dreams in divisional deciders, and all three went on to win county junior B titles afterwards. That suggested that Skibb was not too far away.
The O'Donovan Rossa team that won the 2004 Cork junior B hurling title at their recent reunion. Back from left, Cathal Keohane, Shane Crowley, Tom Ryan, Rob Long, David Keohane, Niall McCarthy and Marcus O'Riordan. Middle from left, John O'Driscoll, William Morris, Fergal O'Connor, Joe O'Driscoll, Tom Curran, Pat McCarthy, Stevie Cotter, Kevin Cotter, James O'Donovan, Shane Keohane and Kieran Walsh. Front from left, Donagh Long, Alan Foley, Ollie Lynch, Conor Long, Flor Crowley, Kevin Crowley, Michael Dan O'Donovan and Gabriel O'Sullivan.(Photo: Anne Minihane)
‘We had seen a lot of the teams that had beaten us go on to county finals, so we knew we had a good enough team,’ Crowley adds. They needed something different in 2004. Enter Gabriel O’Sullivan from Valley Rovers – the Innishannon man, with a new voice, took over as manager. They now had their hurling messiah. And his disciples were willing to listen and learn, to do whatever it took to get over the line. With two great Rossa hurling men, Kieran Walsh and John O’Driscoll, as selectors, Skibb had their very own Three Wise Men.
‘The belief was already there and Gabby gave us that extra, professional step that allowed us to do what we knew we were good enough to do,’ Crowley explains.
Foley agrees, pointing to the structure that O’Sullivan put in place, getting rid of the bad habits that had crept in. Subtle, but important tweaks.
‘He demanded that we had to be training at a certain time, that we had to be on the field ten minutes before it started,’ Foley says, and it was small changes like that to the Rossas’ hurling environment that gave their talent a strong platform to build on.
Rob Long, one of the young guns in 2004, feels that the addition of O’Sullivan as manager was a key piece in the jigsaw. That helped with the buy-in from players. A Toyota Corolla full of Longs and Crowleys – two of the many families that backbone Skibbereen hurling – hit the road west from the city each week to train. No one wanted to miss one of O’Sullivan’s sermons.
‘When we got Gabby in, it was the first time we got an outside coach in the club, that was a backing from the club. We had a really strong panel, we trained really hard; there were two cars coming down from Cork a couple of times a week so we put in a big effort,’ adds Long.
‘We had a good crop of young lads at the time, myself, Kevin Cotter, Michael Dan (O’Donovan), Flor, a couple of Crowleys, William Morris, there was a good shot of us coming through, and then some of the old stagers like Alan, Ollie (Lynch) and a few more of them. We had a good mix.’
It was time to deliver.
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St Mary’s felt the power of the Rossas in their 2004 West Cork opener, as Alan Foley scored 0-9 and Flor Crowley racked up 2-3 in a 2-21 to 1-4 hammering in Dunmanway. St James were next to fall, as Skibb powered to a 1-18 to 0-5 win. Again, Foley was on fire, showing why he wanted to play outfield as he racked up 1-10, including seven from placed balls.
He had played in goal on his way up through Ballincollig before packing in hurling in his late teens. When he landed in Skibb, the hurling bug bit again and Foley wanted to play outfield – it proved to be the right decision before he eventually dropped back into goal again years later.
Next up was the West Cork final against Dohenys. Rossas’ redemption day arrived. Inspired by man-of-the-match Ollie Lynch at centre back, the Skibb men fought off the Dunmanway challenge to triumph 2-12 to 0-13. As the Star headline declared, ‘Rossas back in the big time’.
‘For me, I was content with the West Cork because we had lost so many finals,’ Foley says.
‘I had come down to Skibb in 1996 and started hurling in ’97, and it was big loss after big loss. I remember after the West Cork final, it was a relief that we had won it. Everything after that was a bonus.’
The divisional final was played in Rossmore on a Thursday night, just days before the 2004 All-Ireland hurling final that saw Cork tame Kilkenny the following Sunday. The Skibb celebrations continued under the bright lights of the capital, the Rossas heroes all decked out in their club jerseys.
‘Strangely enough, I was full sure that we would do well in 2004,’ Flor Crowley adds.
‘We were lucky that we were a young team, I was 24, and it wasn’t like we felt our best years were behind us, we always felt we were moving towards our peak.’
In the county series, Rossas were on a roll and defeated both Ballinacurra (1-15 to 0-9) and Churchtown (1-12 to 2-6) to set up a county final against Lismire on Sunday, November 14th, 2004.
The Rossas ran riot, racing to an emphatic 3-17 to 1-7 victory.
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‘It was like the breaking of a dam that day in the county final, we ran away with the match in the end but we had put so much effort throughout the year to get to that level,’ Rob Long notes.
Even though Skibb hit an eye-watering 22 wides that day, they still won by 19 points. Alan Foley starred with 2-8. Kevin Crowley came off the bench at half time and scored 1-1 in the second period. Dermot Hurley tagged on 0-3. Flor Crowley, Colm Keohane, Joe O’Driscoll, Donagh Long and Kevin Cotter all scored 0-1. This was the stuff of dreams at Cork GAA HQ.
‘For us as hurlers to play in Páirc Uí Chaoimh, that had never entered our dreams. This was where we watched our Cork heroes play in Munster finals and now we were on that pitch, there was the thrill to that,’ Flor Crowley says.
‘I think we had about 15 wides in the first half, I must have hit about half of that! In the second half Alan really turned it on, my brother Kevin came on and he scored 1-1. I remember my mother saying about my dad that he wasn’t this happy on his wedding day! He had a massive smile on his face after the game.’
Home are the heroes, as O'Donovan Rossa captain Flor Crowley and his team-mates bring the cup home after their 2004 success. (Photo: Garry Minihane)
Crowley’s father, Florence, has a love for hurling too; in his younger days, pucking around in a field on the family farm outside Skibbereen with his brother and friends. It was Florence who bought his sons their first hurleys, on the way home from the 1984 Munster final. They haven’t put them down since. He also put up goalposts in one of the fields. Build it and they will puck.
His oldest son, Gordon, was the original hurler in the family, and Flor, Kevin and the late Colm all followed. All three were involved in the 2004 success, and again in 2013, but it’s ’04 that leaves the greater memories.
The whole of Skibb seemed to descend on Páirc Uí Chaoimh to watch the coronation of the Kings of November. Their story resonated locally; the heartbreak of those three West Cork final losses was the backstory to their season of success. The town got behind their team. Signs, flags, bunting, this was a great time to be an O’Donovan Rossa hurler which has not always been the case.
‘This was a town used to seeing the footballers in county finals, so it was different to see the hurlers take the main stage. It was something new and they got behind us,’ Crowley says.
‘Maybe they saw our heartbreak. Maybe that saw that we were on a roll. We broke our glass ceiling. A Skibbereen team hadn't won a county hurling title ever before. That was a year for the hurlers. When we got to Páirc Uí Chaoimh, and the chance to play there, we certainly felt like the kings of November.’
The Skibb hurlers won the county junior B again in 2013, but nothing compares to the 2004.
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Playing hurling in a football stronghold means you are fighting against the tide, notes Rob Long who has played both codes with his club. The deeds of the footballers had put the club on the map. Twelve years before the Rossa hurlers won the club’s first county junior B title, Skibb’s senior footballers were crowned county senior champions, and an All-Ireland title followed in 1993. That’s a tough act to follow.
‘At the time there were three senior football teams playing in Skibbereen – ourselves, Castlehaven and Ilen Rovers – so we tried to keep hurling going in that situation. Everyone talks about West Cork being a football stronghold, but Skibbereen is a real stronghold, so the drive and the tightness of the (hurling) group is there, even to this day. The culture in the hurlers is very strong,’ says Long, who is carrying on a family tradition.
Celebrating the Rossas' 2004 success were the Long family; dad Frank at the back with, from left, Donagh, Billy, Conor and Roibeard.
His dad Frank, from Kilmurry, played hurling with Cloughduv and was a Cork minor and intermediate before moving to Skibbereen in the early 1980s where he rolled up his sleeves and got involved in hurling locally.
Hurling is in the Long’s DNA. In 2004, Rob’s older brothers, Donagh and Billy, were involved. So too was his younger brother Conor. They all share the same passion: to keep hurling in Skibb alive.
‘We were a club within a club, up against it to keep hurling going so that bonded us together,’ Flor Crowley says. The triumph in 2004 was a community effort, too, and leaned on players from surrounding clubs who wanted to play hurling – the Skibbereen club gave them the opportunity to play the sport they love. Ollie Lynch from Caheragh, as was Gearoid O’Driscoll. There were Kilmacabea men there too, James O’Donovan and Niall O’Brien.
‘It takes courage to play hurling in a football stronghold,’ Long explains.
‘We have a lot of Caheragh lads playing with us, we had a lot of Ilen Rovers lads who used to play with us. Castlehaven lads. Kilmacabea, too. It really speaks to the ethos of the GAA and participation.
‘What was it like to play hurling as a young fella? We just wanted to hurl. I’d say the same thing to any parent of any young lad out there – if you want to hurl, just go hurling. It’s the best sport to play. Whatever about us being able to play it in our own club, if you are coming from an outside club it’s more difficult again.’
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Alan Foley (48), Flor Crowley (44) and Rob Long (41) will line out for the Skibb hurlers again in 2025. They’re chasing the hat-trick of county junior B titles, Long quips.
They’ll hurl while they can and will keep spreading the hurling gospel around Skibbereen and give local players the chance to play hurling. Every Christmas the heroes of 2004 meet up for a few drinks and a puckaround, and it will be the same again this month, another chance, like the recent 20th reunion, to recall when they were Kings of November, and also remember Alan Foley’s blue Ford Fiesta van. Great times.
