Living legends united in their utter devotion to Dublin GAA
The enduring friendship of Whelan and Gray forged in Gaelic games
JIMMY GRAY is sitting back in a comfy chair in the back room of his house in Willow Park Drive when the doorbell goes. His wife Gretta disappears to answer it. She’s just been recounting how a brief honeymoon diversion in 1959 involved her husband answering an SOS for Dublin and lining out in a Walsh Cup hurling game in Kilkenny.
The things you do for love. In appears another figure bound up in the history and evolution of Gaelic games in the capital; Mickey Whelan, 83 years young.
Mickey was born in May 1939 as World War II loomed. Still dapper in a sports jacket, he was coaching with the St Vincent’s senior camogie team up until recently.
Jimmy has a decade on him, being a child of 1929, a year when fortunes and reputations tumbled in the Wall Street Crash.
Still bright as a button at 93, easily recalling names and details and stories, whether from recent weeks – he was at both county finals involving his beloved Na Fianna – or half a century ago.
The conversation takes in two lives devoted to sport and to Dublin GAA. The Legends Series from Hero Books serves as a valuable record of Irish sporting life down the decades, offering a lovely slice of GAA social history as well.
Jimmy and Mickey are featured in separate new tomes, and over a fascinating afternoon, the pair talk through how their lives have intersected over the past 60 years and more, plus so much more.
A light touch and sense of humour is just part of the reason Gray is such a popular and esteemed part of Dublin GAA – President of the County Board, ‘the Godfather of Dublin GAA’ having been chairman when Kevin Heffernan was appointed and the game transformed.
Whelan, who was scouted by Manchester United aged just 15, earned a degree in Liberal Arts and Social Science at Westchester Community College in New York, with the end goal of being a PE teacher, and the sports science underpinned his time with Heffernan, St Vincent’s and Dublin.
So did either think they would both have published memoirs out at the same time?
Mickey: ‘Definitely not.’
Jimmy: Neither did I. He’s more to write about than me.’
Mickey: ‘I doubt it. How the hell did you get tied in to this?’
When did their paths cross first? ‘I was chairman of Dublin when he was playing,’ says Jimmy. He was only 16 when his life first intersected with that of Heffernan, sharing a bus home after a schools game with the Vincent’s legend.
One of Heffernan’s first acts? To offer him a cigarette.
‘Sure he smoked like a train.
‘It was very hard to get close to him, he was very deep.
‘He said to me, nearly on his way out, “Do you know what Jimmy? If I was to live my life all over again, there’s one thing I wouldn’t have done”. What’s that? “I wouldn’t have smoked”. He thought the world of your man here.’
Jimmy’s mother wanted to make a priest out of him, and he was packed off to a Carmelite school in Wales for a time before taking a different route. Married Gretta in 1959, was a dual player with Dublin before concentrating on hurling. He was goalkeeper in the 1961 All-Ireland final which remains a touchstone for Dublin hurling. The 0-16 to 1-12 defeat by Tipperary featured a contentious point that arguably changed the course of history.
‘It was about a yard wide,’ insists Jimmy. ‘Lar Foley nearly went berserk with the umpire. He started going for your man. I used to spend the whole match trying to keep Lar quiet – he’d say anything!’
When it came to the 1963 All-Ireland football final, Bertie Ahern recalls in the book how his older brother lifted him over the stiles: ‘Mickey Whelan’s performance a stand-out memory.’
Mickey was 24. Moved to midfield in the second half, scored 0-5 of 1-9 and finished as the Championship’s top scorer and was only pipped for Footballer of the Year by Lar Foley.
Reared in Cabra West, a teacher played a part in him heading to Ringsend to play with Clanna Gael before returning from the States to embed himself in St Vincent’s and the Dublin football revolution of the 1970s. It was actually while in America that he ended up lining out with a certain legend of the ash.
Tales of Christy Ring…
In 1973 his sporting prowess saw Mickey on an American invitational team against the All-Stars. With games in Australia and New Zealand, the party was also travelling to Tahiti and Fiji. The definition of a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. And so he found himself togging out with the likes of Kerry’s Mick O’Connell and Cork’s Christy Ring.
At this point, Ring was into his 50s, retired. Yet lined out for both hurling and football teams. ‘That was some journey, Tahiti, Fiji Islands,’ says Mickey. ‘Mick O’Connell was on it too. Ring played the hurling. Then the football. I was on the football team. At half-time he called Mick O’Connell and myself over. “I didn’t come down here to lose!” he says. 50-plus years of age. And he after playing in the previous game!
‘Every ball I get, he says, I’m going to give to you – and you better score!
‘And he said to Micko, every ball you get, you better give it to him. And then you better score!
‘It shows his competitive spirit.’ Jimmy too had his own dealings with Christy, on and off the field.
‘First time I ever played for Dublin down in Cork, in the old Athletic Grounds. The dressing room was under the stand. There were broken bits – if you were in the stand, you could see straight into the dressing room.
‘During the course of the match, there was a high ball going way over the bar. I was watching it in my innocence. Next second – waarrrgh! I get a thump in the chest and was stuck in the back of the net by Ring. He never said a word. Just got up and went out again.
‘About two years afterwards, I joined the Sugar Company. Eithne Haughey who was Charlie’s sister, she was the receptionist. ‘She says, “There’s a gentleman over here. He’s asking for you.” Who is it? “I didn’t ask him his name.”
‘It was Christy, there with his niece. She had applied for a job. He came over afterwards and said, “Listen, that young lassie of mine, she’s the best one for that job”. He hadn’t a feckin’ clue. “You better make sure she gets it. And don’t forget the lesson I taught you in Cork years ago!”
‘Sure I was only in the company three months!’
Heffo’s Army and the Dublin Revolution…
Jimmy: ‘There was consternation that he introduced training on a Saturday morning. Before that it was usually Tuesday and Thursday, and a bit of an exaggeration to call it training. A couple of lads and a kickaround. Heff came in – you (Mickey) did the training programme – and it was all very professional. It was different, modern. Worked a bomb.’
He laughs at a story from his own time in the early 90s when he took over as Dublin hurling manager before bringing Whelan in as trainer.
‘Mick Ryan, a Kilkenny man, we used to train the hurlers. Left the army, went into the Vocational School, North Strand. Part of the training was, there were bars along the wall in the gym, we used to climb up the bars and down. That was part of it.
‘The chat around the city was. “You hear what the Dublin hurlers are doing in training. North Strand Tech. They’re running up the walls and down the walls”.
‘Times have changed.’
So how does the modern golden era – eight All-Ireland football crowns since 2011– compare to Heffo and the 70s?
‘It’s a different era. Much more sophisticated in Jim’s (Gavin) time
because he brought his army training with him. He’d about 16 in the background, didn’t he?’
Whelan was there as coach in 2011 along with Pat Gilroy for the breakthrough win that paved the way. It wasredemption especially after hos own ill-fated tenure as Dublin manager. He was confidant to Gilroy as the Dubs finally reached the Holy Grail, the win that acted as a springboard for the creation of arguably the greatest football team in GAA history.
‘We handed over the Crown Jewels to Jim,’ he says. ‘That team went on to win another five or six All-Irelands. And there’s still three of them playing. I stepped down because my wife Irene was ill. And I had two more great years with her.’
In lockdown, Stephen Cluxton was one of those in touch with Whelan. ‘That’s Stephen. He’s a great human being – you just have to get to know him. He doesn’t go outside his friendship. A lovely guy.
‘He rang me four or five times during lockdown – “Is there anything I can do? Get you any food or anything?”
‘I said no, I’m living with my daughter, she’s looking after me.
‘But he was always touching base.’
Recent times have seen some friends lost, Brian Mullins the latest. Another friend and Dublin GAA icon. The emotion of it is still raw, Mickey’s voice catching slightly as he says: ‘He was a tough guy but gentle behind it all.’
There a photo in the book of the pair in China at the World University Games, both there through their third-level involvement.
Adds Jimmy: ‘I remember one of the trips to Los Angeles where Dublin were playing the All-Stars. At half-time, his team were 15 points behind. Well, Brian gave a display in the second half in 90 degrees of heat – and we won the match by a point. Unbelievable. A one-man show.’
A tale of two Taoisigh…
From a point where he lined out against Charlie Haughey at club level, Jimmy tells of his part in the Na Fianna story.
‘They were a great family in the community in Donnycarney,’ explains Jimmy. ‘The two girls were brilliant. Used to get up at seven o’clock every morning and deliver breakfast out to the poor of Donnycarney.
In fairness to Charlie, he did good too for a lot of people. He did Na Fianna a great favour. We were supposed to be kicked out of Mobhi Road. We didn’t have the most secure tenure. The Board of Works were the controlling unit for public parks and that. We had to leave it by first of July one year. There was consternation in the club. We were halfway through building the clubhouse, were after collecting a fair few bob plus voluntary work.
‘My father was involved with Fianna Fáil. I’m non-political. He said we’ll go down to the local government, at the Customs House. Were told that comes under
Charlie, the
Department of Finance. Same day, down to Leinster House.
‘In we go. A bloody big office – the biggest you ever saw in your life. And a desk in the middle of it. Charlie was there,
‘I’d never met him. My father introduced him. My father was calling him Minister, he was Minister for Finance at the time. He didn’t seem interested, he was looking for a letter in the drawer.
‘So my father said, “for f***’s sake Charlie, would you look up and pay attention!”.
‘“Oh, I’m sorry,” he said. So he listened. Said, “Okay, I’ll be in touch.” I never thought I’d hear from him again. Well, a week later, a letter came, with a copy of a letter from Charlie to the board of works that we were to be accommodated at Mobhi Road.’
The club continues to build a proud legacy there, reaching both of this year’s senior county finals.
Mickey talks of another Taoiseach. St Patrick’s Day, 2008. Bertie Ahern couldn’t make it to Croke Park for the final between St Vincent’s and Nemo Rangers - he had a date with President George W Bush at the White House.
‘Bertie was such a Dublin football fan. And a fan of the club championship.
‘He was away five years in a row for St Patrick’s Day, in the White House. He loved to be at the club finals. He had an aide coming in whispering in his ear.’
To the point where First Lady Laura Bush wondered whether there were alarm bells coming from Ireland.
‘She said, “Taoiseach, have you problems at home?”
“No, why?”
“Your aide-de-camp is coming in and out.”
“Ah no, he’s giving me the scores!”
When Vincent’s won, Ahern wrote a letter of congratulations to Mickey.
IRA protests and hotel alibis…
Jimmy Gray tells the story of the 1977 National League final between Dublin and Kerry, caught up in political turmoil to the extent a couple of Dublin players had to use alibis on the All-Stars trip.
‘There was a National League match. Kerry and Dublin. At halftime, IRA or Republican supporters came onto the pitch in protest.
‘There was a bit of hassle. John McCarthy and David Hickey gave a couple of them kicks in the arse. There was a meeting in O’Connell Street that night where their names were dirt, they gave out hell about them.
‘John O’Donnell was in the paper saying the Hickeys, or John McCarthy wouldn’t be welcome in New York for the All-Stars trip.
‘The gas thing, John wasn’t going to America. The Hickeys, David and Michael, had special cops looking after them in Chicago and New York. The cop’s name was O’Malley. And the fictitious name they were given was O’Malley. It was a real high-tech escapade. Two or three cop cars – one of them was a decoy. They’d go off with a motorbike cop – and then the Hickeys would go in a different one.
‘It was quite serious. There were all sorts of threats.’
In the end, they all got home safely.
Jack Charlton, Italia 90, and Manchester United scout…
Whelan recalls the day a Manchester United scout turned up at his door.
‘I was only young at that stage, only 15. My father came out to the door. I knew I was wanted. An uncle Tom of mine who’d been in Frongach was in the house. Johnny Giles’ father was there, he was a pal of my dad’s.
‘“This gentleman wants to talk to you,” I was told. Billy Beehan, the scout. My dad says, “he’s from Manchester United.
‘I started to cry. I said, “Daddy, I don’t want to go to England.”
‘But one of the guys said, “it might make you rich”.
‘My dad said, “go on back out and play, son”.
‘All my father’s people were living in England. They’d come home at Christmas and summer, playing cards, having a few beers. When it came to go home, they were all crying. It was very upsetting for a young kid to see adults crying.’
Mick Byrne mentions your talent in the book in the same breath as Kevin Keegan and George Best – do you think you had the talent to make it?
‘Of course,’ says Mickey. ‘Sure I did it in America. I’m honoured over there in two different associations.’
He was named the MVP on Westchester’s soccer team, but he never wanted to follow the path of Kevin Moran at Old Trafford?
‘No, no. I did what I did.’
Whelan’s involvement with different teams at university level saw him bring a colleges team to Italy in 1990, dovetailing games with the national team. He ended up in Genoa in the company of Jack Charlton and the senior players the night they knocked Romania out on penalties.
‘I did a bit of work for the FAI for about two years. Mick saw me and said, “come in”. We all went in there. Jack told the team to go out – and my gang went with them. They had a great experience.
‘I was walking down the street with him and cops kept pulling up in cars. He was telling them “Go away, nobody is going to do anything to me. I’m going down here for a few pints”.
Just one of many both Mickey and Jimmy have enjoyed down the years.
As they stand outside the house for a photograph, a neighbour stops to say hello and shoot the breeze. It’s former Dublin player Dermot Deasy, who, in his spare time, cuts Jimmy’s grass and keeps an eye out.
As an illustration of how they are venerated on the northside of the city, it tells its own tale.