DARRAGH FITZGERALD — MINOR FOOTBALLER OF THE YEAR

Darragh Fitzgerald is one of the most noticeable footballers on a football field.

He has a lightning turn of pace, silky skills, he’s tough, he possesses an impressive ability to split a defence with a pass and he always looks like he’s enjoying himself.

That enjoyment was probably never more obvious than the image captured in a photo following the IFC final against Ballinacor last year.

In the photo Darragh is reacting to Cal Kelly’s last gasp goal that secured their promotion to Senior football for 2017 and he is leaping about the field like a young stag and it is an image that sums up what 2016 must have been for the young AGB man.

An Intermediate crown, a Minor title, and a decent run in Leinster were the just rewards for a season of hard work. Last Saturday night Darragh turned up in the Arklow Bay Hotel looking all suave and sophisticated to collect his MFC Player of the Year award and it’s a gong that tops off a magical year for him.

“Winning an award like this tops it all off,” said Darragh. “But we put so much hard work in, and when I say we I mean both the Intermediate and the Minor teams because we all trained together and we really, really did work hard and getting some silverware at the end of the season is nice,” he said.

It was Cal Kelly who forever etched himself into AGB folklore when he got on the end of that last move to fire home to the back of the Ballinacor net. Darragh says it’s hard to put into words the emotions he felt at the time.

“One of my best friends, Cal, you couldn’t write it. The game was more or less over and he goes and does that. I wasn’t the only one jumping, Phil Healy, he’s fairly old, and there’s a picture of him about 10 feet up in the air.

“Everyone was thinking at the time, ‘What are going to do now?” And then quick thinking from our goalkeeper Mervyn Travers, his experience came in and he seen a player free and he kicked it out to him and then straight up the pitch and I think I jogged from our goal around the 21 and their 45 and I couldn.t believe it. It’s hard to put it into words,” he said.

The magic didn’t stop with the IFC success as AGB were looking for a double of Minor titles and they faced a very decent Pearse Gaels in the final, a group team they knew very little about ahead of that decider.

“Well two years in a row, with the same