David Egan
You know that feeling when you wake up and look out the window to the Halls courtyard below, the sun is beaming and there’s not a cloud in the sky? The thought crawling out of bed and making the long journey to Santry to play a match seems all the easier. Sunday last was no exception, it just had that feeling about it from the start. The usual frantic efforts to get players a few hours before kick-off had vanished; the lads were genuinely dying to play. Strutting down to the pond and noticing the newborn ducks, the miniature little creatures were barely a day old, and buzzing around the pond like little terriers. This day had some kind of magic feel to it.
On arriving in the sports grounds in Santry we were met by “Dynamo Chicken Kiev F.C.” already on the pitch and raring to go, doing their sprints and impressive workout regimes. I had a different approach, its something I learnt the hard way as a youngster on underage teams: never change your pre-game routine, even for a cup final! So we didn’t, we strolled out onto the pitch and started having the craic, having pop shots at our keeper, messing and joking about. If you were going on pre match routines we were the sunday league lads just out from the pub, and they were Barcelona!!
For a league decider it was a very open game. End-to-end stuff. We attacked and missed some sitters, and they did the same. We were missing our big man between the sticks Mr. JCR President (Plunkett McCullagh) and it almost proved costly when his cool headed Danish replacement nearly spilled the ball over the line from a shot that was trickling wide. However, it was the Captain who squandered the big chance in the first half. When a fantastic corner was whipped in by Watts, all Egan had to do was tap it into an empty net, and when it seemed easier to score he missed completely. And Temple Road Wanderers were made pay. In the 30th minute Chicken Kiev whipped in a fantastic cross, and where Egan had failed to do only moments before at the other end, Kiev’s towering No.9 didn’t fail to find the net! Wanderers could feel hard done by to go in behind at the break.
The second half was a completely different story though. Wanderers seemed to just get tired, and were second to every ball. In all honesty Chicken Kiev could have gone 3/4 nil ahead. That feeling of waking up to the beaming sun and looking out your halls window looking forward to a crunch game had completely gone. We were knee deep, and there seemed no way out of it. Despair crept in. And it showed when, in a brief display of uncharacteristic anger, Egan lashed out at the opposing left-winger after the ref had missed a deliberate elbow to the face. [Note from the editor: David Egan may not be completely impartial in his analysis of the game’s proceedings] Wanderers seemed to be losing control, and they were lucky to still have 11 men still on the pitch. When experience was needed to cool the heads, none other than Joe Roche stepped up to the plate, the experienced Halls Warden put his arm around some of the lads and calmed then, reminding us we were still in this game.
You know that sinking feeling when there is something you want so much, something you have worked so hard for, something that would repay all those 2 hour journeys to Santry every Sunday morning throughout the year. The sinking feeling that overcomes you as this very thing is being robbed from right under your nose? That’s the feeling that overcame me when I turned to the referee and asked him how long was left to play; “5 minutes” he replied. 5 bloody minutes to score two goals. We simply had to win, a draw would still mean they would win the league on goal difference. It was just simply mission impossible.
Do you also happen to know that other feeling?…. HOPE. Because even though we had been outplayed by arguably a better, fitter & stronger team. We always had the guile and determination that meant we never gave up. That’s HOPE. As long as that score line stayed at 1 nil, we ALWAYS had a chance. That’s HOPE. Never mind the feeling when the ball rippled the opponents net for our first… it was the picture of fellow Sligoman James Thompson grabbing the ball from the net and slamming it down on the centre circle that will be etched in my memory for years to come. That’s HOPE. Now we believed. Once we got one goal, we would get a second. And I don’t even need to continue this fairytale story any longer, the feeling that came over me when young Sam Davidson took on the centre half on his weak foot, and smashed it past Kiev’s keeper was just so immense. There is nothing more sweet in sport, any sports person will tell you that, when victory is snatched in the jaws of defeat…. this meant so much to us!! It was one of those moments when you simply don’t know what to do, shouting and screaming we just piled on top of each other; “We’ve done it!!”…. You’d swear we won the World Cup, to some of us it seemed like we had!… It can only be described as the magic of the Megaleague.
Temple Road Wanderers Team: Fillip Danstrup, James Burke, Matt Merriman, Billy Nash, Finnbar O'Halloran, James Thompson, Mike Watts, Cian Moynihan, David Egan, Sam Davidson(2), Joe Roche. Subs: Emlyn Gavin, Neil Martin, Lorcan Cooper, Doug Gilmour.
