VETERAN DUFFY DELIGHTED TO DEPART ON A HIGH
Ex-Farney star wins Meath title for Farrell having also played under his father
A PROVINCE and a full 16 years removed from his first senior championship medal, former Monaghan goalkeeper and current Ratoath stopper Shane Duffy was unequivocal that his playing days were done on the sodden turf of Páirc Tailteann.
At 38, and after serving two clubs across more than 20 years as well as the Monaghan seniors, he was insistent that his time between the posts was up.
The Farney goalkeeper for much of the 2000s, Duffy cut his teeth with Magheracloone, winning a Monaghan SFC in 2004. On Sunday, he picked up his second Meath SFC winner’s medal and also called time on his playing days.
There was some nice symmetry to his final fling too. This one came working under Ratoath manager Brian Farrell.
Eighteen years earlier, he had played under Brian’s father Dudley in Magheracloone as they contested a Monaghan final.
The spell with Ratoath has been more successful than he could have ever imagined and came about with an unexpected knock at the door of his new house in Ratoath.
Dramatic
“It was literally the second day in the house, a knock came on the door, it was the chairman and the manager at the time,” Duffy recalled.
“I said, ‘Jeez, how did youse know I was here? I don’t know even know where I am so how did youse know?!’”
He joined in 2015 when they weren’t long out of the junior ranks. Six seasons on, he’s picked up more medals. They’d win the intermediate in his first year and now they’ve secured back-toback Keegan Cups after Joey Wallace’s dramatic intervention.
“It makes up for some of the hardship over the years,” Duffy smiled. “I think that was one of the big sort of regrets, like; you go through your career and you genuinely do kind of say, ‘Jeez, I regret this’ and ‘I regret that’. Losing so many county finals, and losing them all by a point or two, semi-finals ... like, everyone in Monaghan will tell you we (Magheracloone) were the dominant team in that period but we just didn’t (win enough). We only won one title, we only have one to show for it.”
Along with losing a few SFC finals with Magheracloone, Duffy was also part of the Monaghan side that came out on the wrong side of Ulster finals in 2007 and 2010. And he admits he felt he was going to be on the losing side in a decider again on Sunday when Brian Hanlon scored his penalty to put Kells three points up in injury-time.
“They’re all the little things you say, ‘Right we (should have won those)...’ and even at the end, it was funny because at the very, very end I was thinking, ‘That’s another one gone, that’s another regret’.
“I was gathering my stuff in the back of the goals thinking: ‘That’s it, I’m going to sign off on a low,’ but look, it’s nice to be on the right side of it for a change.”
With a young family, Duffy is adamant that his playing days are done.
“It’s just you get to the stage where kind of life takes over a bit. The kids are asking, ‘What are we doing this weekend’ and I’m like, ‘Well, it depends on what day I’m training’ or ‘It depends on what time the game is on’ so it’s probably time (to finish up).”
Ratoath will contest the Meath SHC final whenever it is played. The club have recently acquired new land beside their current base which will be developed to meet ever-increasing demand. And the work will continue, even if Duffy needed a crash course in hurling on his arrival.
“I’m involved with the underage system there, we had our U-6s training, our ‘Ducks’ as we call them, and we had 68 kids out training yesterday morning and that’s boys only, the girls have their training as well at the same time. Then the U-7s have their age group on their own, they had about 47, so that’s the numbers we’re dealing with.
“It’s brilliant, it’s great. And you know we always talk in the club about first and foremost we have a responsibility to the GAA, first and foremost. That’s our motto, we get them in and look after them and make sure they all come through that academy, that whatever way life treats them at least that was their starting point.
“We have great numbers and it’s brilliant. It’s hurling and football, there’s no differentiation between the two of them. Everything gets a fair crack of the whip. I had to be introduced to hurling at the start, to figure out what it was when I came up!”