Cork City F.C - gone


We knew all the English soccer songs and chants and we sang that one for Rodney in The Lodge!

Good luck to Rangers. (We have our own troubles at Leeds, at the moment). Have to say, I absolutely despise Mr. Warnock!
 

I don't remember him as a player but he managed Cork City twice and brought us our first LOI Championship.
He was very sick recently but thankfully pulled through.

Anyone remember "Golden Boy" Paul Donovan, the ex Cork Celtic manager and player? He was reported dead a few years ago by the media but he rang the Evening Echo in Cork and said he was alive and well and living in London!
One story that stands out about him was that he was having a pretty bad game on day playing on the wing at the Derrynane side of Turners Cross. The crowd were on his back and giving him grief. He failed to control the ball and it went out of play and again the crowd gave him stick. There was a low wall along that side of the ground and it bounced back into play where upon Golden Boy went to volley it into the crowd and everyone ducked, covering there heads. At the last second, he played a dummy and just tapped it over the line. The crowd laughed and applauded. Golden Boy walked away to defend the throw in and gave the crowd the two finger salute.
 
There was a film on in some cinema in Cork one night. In the bedroom scene all you could see was the legs of the female actress.

From the audience came the remark " Jaysus she has knees like Donie Wallace"


Theres a lot of rubbish spouted about the quality of the League of Ireland mostly from people obsessed with the English Premiership Top Four.
However if you go to a good competitive League of Ireland game with a crowd in on top of the pitch it can be very entertaining. The neutral may not find it so but for those following a club with an interest in their local team what harm is in it ?


I remember games in Cork where Rodney Marsh, George Best and I think a player called Billy Budd lined out. The League went through a phase of signing Ex English/Scottish league has beens to draw in the crowds. I think it was Jimmy Johnstone and Dixie Deans played for Shels for a few games.
 
Then there was the one at Turners Cross one day. A dog ran on to the pitch. One of the players caught the dog and was bringing it to the line. One of the crowd shouted " Leave the dog on. You're coming off"

I don't know if it is true but its a good one
 

Rugby has benefited from consolidation of resources into a smaller number of teams playing in a bigger cross national league. Before the Magners League and Heineken Cup, the top level of non-International rugby was the usual Irish league clubs playing on front of a few hundred people in small clubhouses in the national league - started from a much lower supporter base the LOI soccer currently has. This dispersed support was consolidated into provincial teams playing in the ML & HC and the result has been that professional rugby in Ireland is top class because their are fewer "clubs" and they are playing at a higher level.

It would be great if the same thing happened with soccer in Ireland. I'm a supporter of the Atlantic League concept whereby e.g. LOI, Irish League, Scottish, Welsh and maybe Benelux leagues are linked together with a smaller number of clubs in each country playing in a big well supported professional league. Ireland might only have 2 or 3 clubs in this set-up, but the standard would rival the Premiership. Unfortunately this is a long way off as UEFA (i.e. Platini) want to protect the status of the 4 or 5 big pro leagues in Europe and are fearful of the emergence of leagues of similar strength being formed by smaller nations merging their leagues [the Scandanavia Premiership is the one they fear most as it is likely to happen at some stage]. Even if the Atlantic League was on the cards, we still have the problem in Ireland that many of those involved in the LOI cannot see the big picture and want to protect their little fiefdoms. A merger with the Irish League would be a step in the right direction and is a realistic aim.




Be careful not to turn into an Ebbsfleet type set-up. The people running the club need to have appropriate professional skills and be able to work effectively without the need to go back to get approval from a committee for every move. The key to running a successful sports organisation is getting a small number of trusted people with the appropriate skills in place at a high level with authority to run the club and delegate tasks as necessary. One of the big dangers with community based clubs is that the person who's totally committed to the club and puts in hours with the supporters club, junior teams, raffles etc. etc. does not necessarily have the skills to run a professional clubs. Try and find people within your organisation who have successful track records in business, administration, other sports organisations etc. etc. Avoid anyone who's been deeply involved in the previous club as they will be tainted by the modus operandi - likely to revert to old habits when under pressure.
 
All kicks off again tonight, and I will be at the Derry City v Cork City game.

Really looking forward to it. Especially as its like the rebirth of both teams. The 1st Div's where its at this season in the AirTricity League.
 
RMCF said:
All kicks off again tonight, and I will be at the Derry City v Cork City game.

Really looking forward to it. Especially as its like the rebirth of both teams. The 1st Div's where its at this season in the AirTricity League.
Click to expand...

We were talking about the game in the pub last night. Cork have lost a lot of players but one of the lads said that Derry managed to hang on to most of theirs. Presume that's true. Enjoy it, RMCF!
 
Lex Foutish said:
We were talking about the game in the pub last night. Cork have lost a lot of players but one of the lads said that Derry managed to hang on to most of theirs. Presume that's true. Enjoy it, RMCF!
Click to expand...

Well they lost Jennings, Hutton, O'Brien, Delaney, Martyn, Higgins, Stewart, McGlynn, Kearney, Scullion, Morrow, McManus, Nash.

So yeah, they managed to keep most of their team !!

Their team this season is all local guys, earning a fraction of what they earned last year. Hopefulyl they will show a lot more passion for the club than some of those mentioned above did in past seasons.
 
Dodgy enough 1st half last night, but good enough 2nd.

Cork got a belting goal.

Excellent crowd (around 3500) and good atmosphere. Also good craic in the bars before. Good squad up from Cork - fair play to them for making such a long trip. Nice to have a football league where the fans have mix, have a drink and a bit of banter beforehand without the need for police/ Shows that some fans are passionate enough about Irish football and supporting their local team.
 

There has always been a great relationship between Derry fans and Cork fans. Even when we beat them for the LOI championship in 2005 there fans celebrated with us. The chanting between the opposing fans has always been sarcastic rather than bitter.
Last night we celebrated with the Derry fans after the draw and some of our fans stayed with Derry supporters in their homes.
 

Isn't that the job, Banker! I remember a Cup tie between City and Derry in the 80's. Played in The Lodge. Tucker Allen was City manager. I still have great photos of the occasion. A load of the Derry boys stayed in different houses with us the night before and we had a royaler with them the day of the match. I think City won 1-0 with an Ian Hennessy goal. (I think he went to America after but not sure and don't know where he ended up).

The craic in the pub the night before with the Derry Boys was class! They had a Brazilian playing with them at the time called Owen De Gama. And all night, in the pub the night before, the Derry Boys had their Brazil flags and sang,

Oh, oh, Super oh,
Oh, oh, Super oh,
Oh, oh, Super oh,
Super Owen De Gama!

Will we ever see those days again?
 
Da Gama was South African. A great player.

Nelson Da Silva was the Brazilian.
 

I was at that game. 1986 was the year. Derry must have brought 8,000 to that game and they out numbered the City support. That gate kept City going for the rest of the season.
 
Yeah we used to get massive crowds back in the 80s, just after we came back into senior football. Shame those days are gone.

That was all before 1991, the great Sky TV/Premiership hype machine got into full swing.

Don't think we will ever see those days again, as we now have a generation who think that football started in 1991.
 
RMCF said:
Da Gama was South African. A great player.

Nelson Da Silva was the Brazilian.
Click to expand...

Thanks for clearing that up.

Yeah looks like those good old days are gone, for a while, at least. Back then, a friend and myself used to go to the home matches on Sundays in The Lodge and back to the nearby Silver Key pub afterwards. Some of the City players used to come in as well and we'd always have a good old craic. When they moved to Turner's Cross, the two of us used to head back to The Lion's Den after matches to watch the Serie A football on tv. Really enjoyed those evenings. And Serie A had huge names playing then. The quality of football was excellent and there was no saturation coverage of football like we have now!
 
The_Banker said:
I was at that game. 1986 was the year. Derry must have brought 8,000 to that game and they out numbered the City support. That gate kept City going for the rest of the season.
Click to expand...

One of my outstanding memories of the day is the huge international flags the Derry supporters had.

The Derry boys next to us had cans and cans of beer they'd brought with them and they shared them with us. I remember nearly cracking up when they told us how cheap they were to buy up North, at the time!
 

FOr me, that is the greatest memories I have of football (other than watching Maradona play in the 86 WC).

Was that the early 90s? The time that Sampdoria were sensational to watch, and they played amazing attacking football. In fact all of Serie A was good. All teams had a handfull of great players, even the lower ones. Samp has Lombardo, Vialli and Mancini. Milan had the 3 Dutch men, Inter had the 3 Germans. Great times. Back when football was football.
 

Yep! A pure pleasure to settle down with a pint in front of you to watch it. The Inter and AC teams were incredible back then. And, as you said, even the weaker teams had good players. Late 80's/early 90's.

And so few of the current crop of soccer fans in Ireland know what a big factor Liam Brady was, in Serie A, a few years prior to all that. He scored a penalty in the final game one season to win the League for Juventus.

And, of course, there was this goal with Arsenal......

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u--2vzQP6KQ&feature=related

Look at that!!! Oh, look at that!!!!!!
 
Great link, RMCF. Some serious names in there. Brought back a hell of a lot of memories.................
 
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