Clonmullion are more than just a club

Brian Hickey has seen it all through a long career but even he was taken aback by what he saw in a crazy Lumsden Cup final.

“It’s massive to win that. It was a looking dodgy there for a while,” he admitted.

“Two goalkeeper changes is not what you want. Mick Lawless going off probably gives them a boost, he’s a massive ‘keeper and a massive personality on the team but two boys that came in kept us in the game – Nathan Germaine and then Corey after that made some great saves and hats off to them and all the boys, they are absolutely fantastic. It wasn’t our best performance but they kept going, kept persevering and got their reward in the end,” said Hickey.

He had spent the previous week on holiday with match winner Corey Moore and said that although he was an unlikely hero, nobody deserved it more.

“I’ve been with Corey all week, we’ve been away on holidays and we only got home last night. From him to go from that to being the hero today is amazing but he deserves it, he’s been a great servant to the club and he deserves it,” said Hickey.

After three successive Senior Division titles, a sluggish start to the season cost Clonmullion the chance of challenging for another league crown but Hickey has been delighted with the way that the team have found their form again as the season has gone on.

“After four games of the season there was a lot of talk of Clonmullion being finished and us being done but we didn’t believe that. We know how good we are, we know the personalities we have in the dressing room. We’ve had a long 18 months with the Leinster Junior Cup last year and we felt we left that behind us. We had no pre-season because of that and then we had injuries at the start of the year to Garry Comerford, Mark Hughes, Cody Mulhall, massive players. We got everybody back but a little too late to have a shot at the league unfortunately. We put in a good performance in the Senior Cup quarter-final against Naas Utd and we felt we could have won that but they shaded it and the best of luck to them. To finish with a Lumsden Cup and feel it’s been a bad year just shows what these lads are made of,” he said.

The spirit that exists within the club was obvious from the celebrations and the support that the team received throughout the game and Hickey says it’s a very special bond in the club. On Sunday, the club’s second team compete in the Premier Division Cup final and Hickey hopes there can be a fixture re-arrangement to allow them to attend and lend their support.

“There is a Premier Cup final for our second team next week and unfortunately for us we have game against Mullingar Town in the FAI Junior Cup clashing and we’d like to get that moved so we can get there to support the boys. The second team have helped us out this year and they’ve been massive for us. The club is just unbelievable. The supporters travel everywhere to watch us. I know they are loud, the referees and fourth officials probably don’t like them but they are just fantastic,” smiled Hickey.