Driving Kilcar

To find out how a club with just 300 playing members will have five players on active duty in Sunday’s All-Ireland finals, go back to 1979.

Back then, Kilcar was an entity surviving in Donegal’s football heartland. Surviving being the operative word. Then Michael Carr made his mark in Donegal colours book-marked by two Ulster titles in 1974 and 1983 and the landscape changed. In 1979, the national school, Scoil Chartha Naofa, was opened and the identity of the club returned. Before Jamesie and Martin McHugh, Carr’s presence provided the seed for a generation of domination. From 1975 to 1993, they claimed seven league titles and four county championships.

But when that generation passed, so too did the phase of dominance. While Martin McShane and Michael Hegarty kept the torch burning in the ‘90s and noughties and Mark McHugh lit the flame in 2012 it wasn’t really until the last weekend in August that the club became nationally relevant again. That was the day when club-mates Ryan McHugh and Stephen McBrearty earned man-of-the-match awards in the senior and minor semi-finals.

It’s been a long haul back but faith in the club structures, coaching systems and work in Coláiste na Carraige have paid off in time for the sons of the 80s and 90s teams to come of age.

“I would have first seen Ryan and Patrick [McBrearty] at U10s,” said club diehard and former county chairman, Charlie Ó Donáill.

“They were the two exceptional players around that time. Both of them have huge talent and were very skilful lads, no matter what they played. I remember one year, we organised indoor hurling over the winter and both of them were on the team. They went off and won a competition within the county for outside hurling. That would have been exceptional for this part of the county because there is no hurling here in West Donegal, it would all be in East Donegal.”

The minor side possesses future national talents with Patrick’s younger brother, Stephen, the standout performer after a near two-year layoff with a cruciate knee injury while Conor Doherty and Andrew McClean swell the ranks.

They could, and should, have had another senior player if Mark McHugh had stayed. Since returning from his summer in America, he’s back training with the club. Outwardly, he’s saying he’s happy with the decisions he made, but in his club dressing room, everyone knows this will be a tough week for him.

“He made the decision himself and that’s the way for him,” said his underage club and Colaiste na Carraige coach, Neily Byrne. “He’s probably hurting a little bit behind the scenes, naturally enough, because if you’re a footballer, you want to play in All-Ireland finals. But, he says himself, he’s content enough and happy enough with the decision he made. The door is open to him to go back next year. He’s back training hard and that keeps him ticking over. His running ability is unbelievable. I know Ryan is good as well but Mark was a leader on the field for us. During those years in the tech [school], he was a leader.”

While there are those in the county who say he made the wrong call, the club’s elders think he made the right decision for himself.

“It’s unfortunate that Mark’s losing out this year but then again lads between 18 and 24... it’s a difficult time in anyone’s life,” added Charlie.

“It’s hard to get work, it’s hard to settle down and it’s hard to know what you’re going to do with your life. He was right to take a year out it’s just unfortunate he’ll miss out on the All-Ireland final. He’s a good future ahead of him though and he’ll shine again.”

Neily remembers the day they first realised Mark’s strengths lay not in an attacking role but as a deep lying player. An accident, yes, but one which led to him earning an All Star in 2012.

“We were playing an anonymous game in the schools in Ulster when it dawned on us that he should come back and play the extra man role,” he said. “Mark was always considered a half-forward up until then. It took off. I’m not saying Jim McGuinness took it out of our book but just that he was excellent. We were in trouble in the back line and we took him back, not as a sweeper more a tidy-up man, and from there on, he had that role with the club and the county.”

The differences between him and his younger brother are minute. Both Charlie and Neily, like most Kilcar men, are fans of the running game and in the two McHughs, they saw the perfect athletes to develop the style within the club. The McBreartys were different men, though.

“Patrick was always a fantastic footballer with a big left foot on him,” said Neily. “He was big and strong for his age and had all the football ability in the world. The club was playing in wee competitions underage and Patrick was the man, there’s no point saying anything else. You got the ball to him and he did the rest.

“Ryan and Patrick always played well together and came up through the ranks together. They’d be very close and bounced off each other. You can put it all down to their hard work based on a running game. They’ve always been taught to keep the ball.

“Stephen is a great player. He has all the ability but had a bad cruciate knee ligament injury and the school didn’t really get it out of him these last two years but they’re really getting it out of him now. He’s coming into form. He’s a man you’d play around the half-forward line and Declan Bonner puts him out there. That’s ideal for him. He’s very hard to stop and exceptionally strong and quick. Paddy, to me, had a better left foot but Stephen works a little bit harder than Paddy.”

That made this year’s Markey Cup win (Ulster U18 Vocational Schools) all the more remarkable. Without Stephen, they should have been out of their depth, but the team, an amalgamation of a few clubs in the area, found the resolve and claimed a first Ulster title since John Joe Molloy led the way in 1985.

Used to fighting against the odds, the Kilcar men are confident that no matter what happens this weekend, the new generation’s presence will help build for future successes.

“We’ve a pick of 300 people. That’s man, woman and child in the club,” said Neily. “If you look at Colaiste na Carrige, there were only 212 pupils there last year and we won the Ulster title. I didn’t think it was possible without Stephen McBrearty. You get out of things what you put in.

“Everywhere you go now they’re talking about football, football, football. It filters through to the next crop and keeps the whole thing going. Before that we had Hegarty and he was a great servant who we were delighted to see win an Ulster medal. I’m training the U16s this year and all they’re talking about are these lads. They can relate to them because they’re only a couple of years older than them. They should be aiming to get to that place and it gives them that little bit extra.”

It leads us back to the secret. The formula to build a generation of superstars.

“I was involved at county level from 2000 on as treasurer, chairman and secretary for my sins,” said Charlie. “At national level back then, there was a huge emphasis on restructuring counties and clubs and getting coaching right. The influence of the Ulster Council was massive and we bought into it.”

For Neily though, it all boils down to luck, good genes and a leader.

“Ah I don’t know. First of all, these lads came through as exceptional players. Before this, we had a few but now all of a sudden, we have five or six.

“They came along at the right time and Jim McGuinness has a huge influence, with the way he set up the thing and got the best out of them. These lads were always good enough to play for the county but to push it on and play in an All-Ireland final... it’s down to their belief. They believe in the system and will play it regardless.”

It probably lies somewhere between the two but no matter what befalls of the Kilcar men on Sunday, with a Comortas Peile na Gaeltachta in the bag and the league soon to follow, the club game in this part of the world has never been stronger.