‘It’s been sickening watching Dundalk winning trophies’, says Mark McNulty

When time was finally called, Mark McNulty threw himself to his knees and raised his arms towards the darkened Dublin sky, fists clenched in celebration.

The club’s story, and his part in it, is far from done, but there was nonetheless a sense of culmination for the one player in yesterday’s line-up who was there six years ago when Cork City Foras Co-Op played their first ever game in the first division.

Many were the hands that made Cork City work again as a club off the pitch after the dark times, but McNulty was the rock that this team — the visible expression and essence of the organisation — was built on.