KILLINAN END - Fifty years since Moyne shocked Roscrea

Thurles Sarsfields and Loughmore-Castleiney in a County final seems commonplace until you consider the evidence. Perennial contenders in the final shake-up it would seem but only once before have they met in the final. The tradition of Sarsfields on County final day is long-established of course with a few among their number this weekend looking to add to an already impressive haul of County medals.

Loughmore/Castleiney’s rise in the modern era can be dated to County Minor titles won in 1976 and 1979 followed on with admirable efficiency to Under-21 and Intermediate County final successes. If anything sums up the club it was the ability to go from Intermediate champions in 1980 to contesting a County Senior final against a formidable Borris-Ileigh team just three years later.

It is a time of plenty for Mid Tipp with Sarsfields, Loughmore and Drom adding to the great record of this division in recent decades including Boherlahan in 1996 and Moycarkey-Borris in the 1980s.

Half a century ago the division had perhaps its more unlikely winner when Moyne-Templetuohy took the Dan Breen cup home. Its unlikeliness is no diminution of Moyne-Templetouhy rather an expression of how formidable their opponents from the North were and how much of an outsider the Mid representatives were at the time.

Roscrea’s pre-eminence was heralded from a long time out. At Senior level the club had always been a presence if a relatively modest one as measured by ultimate success. A final had been contested and lost controversially in the early days, but four finals were lost in 1936, ’45, ’54 and ’63 – one a decade and all to Mid opposition. By the time the club reached its next final in 1967 when they lost to Carrick Davins a new source of talent was in full flow. The club had by that stage won eight of the previous ten County Minor titles including a scarcely believable six-in-a-row between 1958 and 1963.

Often, we have seen youthful potential squandered, but that accusation cannot be laid at Roscrea’s door. A first ever County Senior final win in 1968 against Thurles Sarsfields had lain a few ghosts from the past. Jimmy Doyle had helped save the day in the semi-final against Borris-Ileigh but could not turn back the red tide in the final. Indeed, the Sarsfields reliance on his introduction at half-time contrasted with Roscrea’s youth and vigour, not forgetting Kieran Carey in defence to add a grizzly experience to the youthful blossom.

A mild straw in the wind that year was the pluckiness of Moyne-Templetuohy in the semi-final against Roscrea. They would meet again three years later but not before Roscrea had hit spectacular heights. The championship of 1969 was a landmark event as it was an all-county open draw – a situation which lasted almost a decade and threw up contests previously unimaginable. Roscrea best Carrick Davins comprehensively in the 1969 final, a contest which marked the end of Davins’ golden period of the late ‘60s when they played in four finals in five years winning two. It would be another 28 before the next team from the South reached the final.

Roscrea won again in 1970 though had a tough campaign, not least from Seán Treacy’s and Newport, along the way to a two-point final win over Sarsfields. From a North Tipp perspective, it is interesting that Sarsfields beat Borrisokane in the County semi-final that year as very soon Borrisokane were back in the Intermediate ranks. If Roscrea’s win in 1970 marked the first three-in-a-row for a North team in over half a century, their prospective opponents of the following year were also breaking new ground.

Though Moyne-Templetuohy’s day in the sun was singular and fleeting it was no overnight success. The No. 1 Junior championship – the Intermediate grade in new money – was won in 1965. A year later a win over perennial champions Thurles Sarsfields was a new high-water mark. By 1970 a first Mid Senior title was a genuine sign of progress when Sarsfields were beaten by 2-11 to 3-7. Roscrea beat Sarsfields by two points in the County final despite having a good lead at half-time so outwardly the signs were there that this new force from the Mid could be contenders.

Nonetheless, few would have expected Roscrea to not win another title in 1971 and Moyne-Templetuohy entered the final rank outsiders. In a tough tense low-scoring game Roscrea were a point down at half-time and the assumption might have been that a team which had found a way to win three County finals, five North titles, and would win an All-Ireland title a few months later, would once more find a way. For once they came up short and it was the team in Green and Gold who found the two key goals. In the end the margin was eight points – in the context of all that went before and after with this Roscrea team it was an upset of epic proportions. They won the next two County finals just to prove that point. But for one day fifty years ago bonfires roared in the heart of Mid Tipperary in a manner that will hardly be equalled no matter what happens this weekend. Half a century they compete for a County Intermediate title – who knows where it might lead?