mild-mannered, was enraged. He stood up, roared, and punched the door hard. We rumbled out onto the pitch like marines landing on the beach. Tony was superb in a total shut-out, never giving Mattie a kick.
Afterwards, when we had showered and were leaving, I spotted the paper, scrumpled up under the bench in the corner. I went over and lifted it. I read the interview, smiling and shaking my head. It was nothing only compliments from Mattie. A privilege to play against Tony Scullion and so on. Coleman had made it all up.
He once asked me to come over to the Rossa pitch in Magherafelt the Saturday before a championship match, but told me to say nothing about it. Patsy O’Donnell and Eamonn’s son Gary were there, already togged out. ‘Jody’, he said, ‘I want you to test these two men out.’ I went to full forward. First Patsy picked me up. Half a dozen times the ball was put in for me to run onto, take him on and try to score. Then it was Gary’s turn. Afterwards, Eamonn beckoned me over to the sideline. ‘Well Jody, which one of them would you pick at corner back tomorrow?’ I thought about it for a second, and said, ‘Have we nobody else?’ He tried to keep a straight face, but quickly burst out laughing. ‘What are we going to do with you, Jody?’ he said, as he walked away, ‘what are we going to do with you?’
In 1992, Donegal and ourselves were invited to a civic reception in the Guildhall to celebrate our National League title and their All-Ireland. We were all there, but Donegal sent their sub goalie. Coleman was livid, and viewed it as a deliberate insult. Before we played them in the Ulster Final the following year, he was delivering one of his blistering motivational speeches, not that it was needed. In the middle of it, he roared, ‘That’s how much they think of you. You’re shit under their shoe. They sent the sub goalie to the reception in the Guildhall. Their fucking sub goalie.’ Don Kelly, our sub goalie, put his hand up. ‘What is it, Don?’ ‘I just wanted to say thanks a million, Eamonn.’ The changing room, including Eamonn, exploded into laughter, yet another team meeting ending in confusion.
After we had won the All-Ireland, he invited one of the Biggs brothers into the panel. Gary and Gregory were good dual players and had been making a name for themselves. Biggs arrived for his first session, into this ultra-competitive, seasoned group of All-Ireland winners, led by Henry Downey, who would have intimidated Roy Keane. After the warm-up, we did ten 100m sprints. Then, it was into an A v B game. There was no sign of Biggs. Colm O’Kane, the groundsman, said, ‘He went home after the sprints.’ Coleman called Tohill over and said, ‘Anthony, I think I brought the wrong wan.’
It is no exaggeration to say we loved the man. Maria McCourt’s beautiful book captures a beautiful spirit, and for that we thank her.
NOTE TO THE READER
In early 2002, I got a call from Eamonn who asked, ‘Have you ever thought about writing a book?’
‘Just your autobiography,’ I replied.
‘Good. Meet me tomorrow night at the Carrickdale.’
Which I did along with Liam Hayes, the former Meath player and journalist. Eamonn was planning on retiring – again – and Liam was to publish his autobiography.
I agreed to write the book if Eamonn would agree to talk openly – having interviewed him as a sports journalist myself, I knew how cagey he could be.
He – unconvincingly – agreed and for the next few months we met, me having drawn up questions and him doing his best not to answer them: Derry and football were no bother, personal insights were a different matter.
The retirement was short-lived – again – and he called a halt in early summer, saying we’d return to the project when he eventually gave up the game.
It was to be his cancer diagnosis in 2005 which brought us back to the idea, Eamonn suggesting we start again with ‘just the two of us this time’.
I contacted several publishers and interest in the book was strong, unfortunately Eamonn wasn’t and we got little else done.
It was a long time after his death before I could return to the tapes and longer still again before I knew what to do with them. He hadn’t finished his story and I wasn’t prepared to fill in the gaps.
Now, eleven years after his loss, and twenty-five since his greatest triumph, the autobiography we began has become a sports memoir of his All-Ireland glory.
The autobiographical elements remain, as does his incredible vernacular, the language of the lough shore which helped make his utterances so unforgettable. It would take a braver person than me to edit, ‘Youse boys knows nathin’ about futball’, and when his speech conveyed so much, why would you even want to try? So, I’ve tried to stay true to his voice, just as I’ve stayed true to what he wanted to say, which is, basically, ‘Derry and the ‘Quigan rule’ and ‘the players is the men.’ Doire abu.
PROLOGUE
SOME BOY
by Maria McCourt
Red, white. Silver. That’s how I see it through his eyes as he leaves the shores of Lough Neagh. The red and white of Derry. The silver of the Sam Maguire. Blue, grey, green, black … red, white. Silver. The blue of the lough, the lane from his bungalow, up through the fields to the asphalt road. To Croke Park, boys … Croker. The silver of the Sam Maguire. The cathedral of Gaelic football awaits the ‘third Sunday in September’ faithful but today is just the third Saturday and the pilgrimage has yet to be made.
He is Eamonn Coleman, my uncle, my godfather and friend. But to them he’s the Little General, the Boss, the Leader, the Man. For only the second time in the county’s history – and the first in thirty-five years – the senior footballers are in the All-Ireland Final, the Championship’s ultimate stage. By his side is his son Gary, a key player in this ’93 team. The warm words from his aunt as he leaves: ‘Don’t come back here without Sam’. She’s not renowned for her sentimentality, my grand aunt Eliza Bateson, but she has been here in their South Derry home since Eamonn was a boy.
‘She came to look after the house when my mother was very ill. She did all the heavy work, for mammy was weak, ye know.’ He tells me this during one of our chats. We’re pals and I’m proud to be so. Possessed by football, at just thirteen, he had ‘not a clue’ how ill ‘mammy’ was. When she died – in the early summer of ’61 – he missed her, ‘Ach, I did surely but it was worse for Eileen and Mae.’ Eileen is the eldest and his senior by nine years, then two years below her is Mae. She is my mother and despite being his big sister, she has always seemed, to all of us, the baby. ‘They kissed her and touched her in the coffin but I couldn’t. I didn’t even cry.’
His father Tommy had little interest in the GAA but his mother was ‘football mad’. He doesn’t believe it’s in the genes, though: ‘All oul’ nonsense that. Ye take football after nobody; you’re either good enough or you’re not.’ So, the All-Ireland-winning Derry minor, and All-Ireland-winning U21, is now a successful county manager, in the final with his footballer son – his All-Ireland-winning Derry minor and Ulster U21-winning son.
On the surface, gruff and closed, he has ‘no truck’ with introspection and is famously a terror with sports journalists across Ireland. But, the more abuse he gives them the more their copy purrs. ‘The High Priest of Irreverence’ is ‘roguish’, ‘charismatic’ and ‘shrewd’. But Christ he can give them a lick – and anyone else should they rouse his ire. He’s not bad tempered by any means, full of fun and craic and chat, but his passion for the game is messianic and there’s no mercy – no mercy – for blasphemers.
‘Youse boys
