THE DATE IS 20 May, 2024. Five minutes and 26 seconds of an additional six minutes have been played when Shelbourne’s Tyreke Wilson picks up possession just inside the St Patrick’s Athletic half.
The score is 1-1, a mesmerising Jake Mulraney free-kick having cancelled out Sean Boyd’s first-half effort. Shels supporters are surely content to leave Inchicore with a point.
There’s 95 minutes and 35 seconds on the clock by the time Wilson has manoeuvred his way into the St Pat’s box and pulled the ball back into the path of Evan Caffrey. For the next three seconds, time moves slowly. The youngster feints and sends Chris Forrester to the deck, then squeezes a strike through a crowd of bodies and into the bottom corner. The referee’s watch reads 95 minutes and 39 seconds when the Shed End erupts. A week might be a long time in politics, but 13 seconds is a long time in League of Ireland football.
There’s so much going on in the 30 seconds after the ball hits the back of the net. Caffrey’s shirt swings wildly above his head, and Dean Williams is nearly decapitated as he attempts to join the celebrations. Closer to the sideline, Sean Boyd unleashes a roar at the small pocket of reds seated in the main stand.
Laszlo Geczo / INPHO
Laszlo Geczo / INPHO / INPHO
Some 50 metres up the pitch, Stephen Kenny watches on despondently as his former Ireland colleague Duff is lifted into the air by Joey O’Brien, before the Shels boss turns to the TV camera and lets a roar: “F**king get in there”.
Do not scratch your eyes, Shelbourne are in fact four points clear at the top of the Premier Division.
Duff afterwards tells reporters he wouldn’t have picked anyone but Caffrey to score this massive goal.
The pair’s relationship spans almost a decade, beginning at Shamrock Rovers where Duff began his coaching career in the Hoops’ underage programme. The Rovers U15 side quickly attracted media attention for their 6am morning sessions as Duff looked to give his players more time on the pitch; a benefit taken for granted by their peers in English academies.
Caffrey and Duff in the Rovers U15 days.
Talk to Caffrey now and he’ll tell you Duff’s methods accelerated his development.
“It was just good to get more time on the ball than everyone else,” Caffrey tells The 42.
“All the lads in that Rovers team, we all loved working with him. I think we just loved being ahead of everyone else and we loved everyone else always giving out about us, saying ‘It’s a bit extreme and stuff like that’.
Advertisement
“Honestly, we loved it. We enjoyed being hated by everyone at underage level. We kind of embraced it.”
They’ve both switched green for red since, but it’s clear the siege mentality endures. Speaking to Shels’ YouTube channel following a 2-0 victory against his former club in Tallaght, Duff said: “I think a lot of fans outside Shelbourne football club hate us more than they love their own team and long may it be that way.”
Whether the eventual league winners were genuinely hated or not, Shelbourne were never ignored as they battled towards the title.
A terrible run of form following their European games resulted in Shels picking up just one league win in a two and a half months period. Yet destiny was still in the hands of Caffrey and his teammates. Beat Waterford, Drogheda United and Derry City in their final three games and the title would be coming back to Tolka Park for the first time in 18 years.
“I don’t think there was anyone in the team that didn’t think we would win the games. We all believed we would win every game,” Caffrey says.
“I think it’s mad because before the Derry game, it was probably the calmest I’ve seen the lads before a match all season. Even on the bus journey up and in the hotel beforehand, everyone was just so calm. Everyone just knew what we had to go out and do. I think that’s why we ended up going and doing it.
“I just knew we were going to win the league. Even in the last few minutes when obviously we hadn’t got the goal yet, I still really believed we would go and do it. I knew the goal would come from somewhere. I think that’s the belief everyone had. I was delighted that it was Harry [Wood] who got the goal because he’s one of my best mates.”
Caffrey’s serene confidence was tested when seven minutes of added time were put on the board. They were, he says, “the longest minutes of my life”.
“I was just looking at the ref every two minutes, just waiting to see if he was ever going to blow the whistle. Then he finally did. It was mad, it was just amazing,” he says.
“The second that the whistle went I ran straight over to the Shels end. My dad and my brother were there, so I was looking for them in the stand. My brother came climbing down the steps and he ended up running on to the pitch and jumping on top of me. It was surreal.”
It’s natural that family was the first thing on Caffrey’s mind amid the chaos on the Brandywell astroturf. The 21-year-old comes from Shelbourne and Dublin football royalty.
Caffrey along with Gavin Molloy (who departed Shelbourne midway through their title charge for Aberdeen) are grandsons of Reds legend Theo Dunne who captained the 1960 FAI Cup-winning team, as well as leading Shels out in their Cup Winners’ Cup tie away to Barcelona in 1963.
Dunne’s son Thomas played for Shels across a four-year period, while his uncles, Bob and Paddy Thomas featured in Shels’ league winning campaign in 1928/29, with Bob also going on to manage the Reds to another league crown in 1952/53.
Outside of the Shels bubble, Caffrey is also a second cousin of Republic of Ireland legend Richard Dunne.
Being part of such a bloodline could add pressure, but Caffrey doesn’t see it that way. He’s always been determined to forge his own path, and in doing so contribute to the shared legacy.
“I think sometimes, for me, definitely, you can get sick of hearing things about what other people have done in the family, and you want to go out and create your own bit of history. And I think we have that now, so it’s kind of nice to then mash them all up together,” he says.
“My aunty still has my grandad’s league medal, so when we got ours, I brought it down to the house, and we were just looking at the two of them side by side. It’s just an amazing thing for us to have as a family, for him to have won it with the same club as his two grandsons. It’s brilliant, it’s really special.”
Celebrating with his family in the moment’s following title victory was instinctive for Caffrey, but his thoughts also quickly went to those supporters who stormed the pitch in celebration.
“I can only imagine what it means to some people, considering the dark days that the club went through over the last number of years. I‘d say it meant the world to those fans,” he says.
As a former Rovers prospect from Tallaght, it is perhaps unsurprising that Caffrey grew up as a passionate Hoops supporter. He too knew lean times as a fan.
“I remember it felt like such a long period when Dundalk and Cork were dominating. I was wondering then if Rovers were ever going to bleeding win the league, so I can at least understand that part from a fan’s point of view,” he says.
The Rovers fandom has certainly been put on hold for the time being. Caffrey recently told the Signature Fire Protection podcast that during the off season he took some pleasure in eliciting the odd dirty look from passers-by as he walked his dog through the streets of Tallaght while donning his Shelbourne Champions tee.
Now that the new season is here, however, Duff and his staff will not let the players rest on their achievements. That was the past. The future is now.
“Anyone can win one title. It’s about going out and doing it again. That’s the hard part,” Caffrey says.
“The message is the same, we’ve got to go out there and play the same way and win it again.
“I think everyone’s heads have kind of forgotten about winning the league. Everyone’s focus now is on the new season. Last year is in the past now. We had our celebrations, whatever. Now it’s back to work. Now we’ve been back on the pitch working hard and we’re ready to go again this year.”
Friday – Shelbourne v Derry City, 7.45pm. Live on Virgin Media 2.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
Close
Comments
This is YOUR comments community. Stay civil, stay constructive, stay on topic.
Please familiarise yourself with our comments policy
here
before taking part.
‘Anyone can win one title. We’ve got to go out there and win it again. That's the hard part’
THE DATE IS 20 May, 2024. Five minutes and 26 seconds of an additional six minutes have been played when Shelbourne’s Tyreke Wilson picks up possession just inside the St Patrick’s Athletic half.
The score is 1-1, a mesmerising Jake Mulraney free-kick having cancelled out Sean Boyd’s first-half effort. Shels supporters are surely content to leave Inchicore with a point.
There’s 95 minutes and 35 seconds on the clock by the time Wilson has manoeuvred his way into the St Pat’s box and pulled the ball back into the path of Evan Caffrey. For the next three seconds, time moves slowly. The youngster feints and sends Chris Forrester to the deck, then squeezes a strike through a crowd of bodies and into the bottom corner. The referee’s watch reads 95 minutes and 39 seconds when the Shed End erupts. A week might be a long time in politics, but 13 seconds is a long time in League of Ireland football.
There’s so much going on in the 30 seconds after the ball hits the back of the net. Caffrey’s shirt swings wildly above his head, and Dean Williams is nearly decapitated as he attempts to join the celebrations. Closer to the sideline, Sean Boyd unleashes a roar at the small pocket of reds seated in the main stand.
Some 50 metres up the pitch, Stephen Kenny watches on despondently as his former Ireland colleague Duff is lifted into the air by Joey O’Brien, before the Shels boss turns to the TV camera and lets a roar: “F**king get in there”.
Do not scratch your eyes, Shelbourne are in fact four points clear at the top of the Premier Division.
Duff afterwards tells reporters he wouldn’t have picked anyone but Caffrey to score this massive goal.
The pair’s relationship spans almost a decade, beginning at Shamrock Rovers where Duff began his coaching career in the Hoops’ underage programme. The Rovers U15 side quickly attracted media attention for their 6am morning sessions as Duff looked to give his players more time on the pitch; a benefit taken for granted by their peers in English academies.
Talk to Caffrey now and he’ll tell you Duff’s methods accelerated his development.
“It was just good to get more time on the ball than everyone else,” Caffrey tells The 42.
“All the lads in that Rovers team, we all loved working with him. I think we just loved being ahead of everyone else and we loved everyone else always giving out about us, saying ‘It’s a bit extreme and stuff like that’.
“Honestly, we loved it. We enjoyed being hated by everyone at underage level. We kind of embraced it.”
They’ve both switched green for red since, but it’s clear the siege mentality endures. Speaking to Shels’ YouTube channel following a 2-0 victory against his former club in Tallaght, Duff said: “I think a lot of fans outside Shelbourne football club hate us more than they love their own team and long may it be that way.”
Whether the eventual league winners were genuinely hated or not, Shelbourne were never ignored as they battled towards the title.
A terrible run of form following their European games resulted in Shels picking up just one league win in a two and a half months period. Yet destiny was still in the hands of Caffrey and his teammates. Beat Waterford, Drogheda United and Derry City in their final three games and the title would be coming back to Tolka Park for the first time in 18 years.
“I don’t think there was anyone in the team that didn’t think we would win the games. We all believed we would win every game,” Caffrey says.
“I think it’s mad because before the Derry game, it was probably the calmest I’ve seen the lads before a match all season. Even on the bus journey up and in the hotel beforehand, everyone was just so calm. Everyone just knew what we had to go out and do. I think that’s why we ended up going and doing it.
“I just knew we were going to win the league. Even in the last few minutes when obviously we hadn’t got the goal yet, I still really believed we would go and do it. I knew the goal would come from somewhere. I think that’s the belief everyone had. I was delighted that it was Harry [Wood] who got the goal because he’s one of my best mates.”
Caffrey’s serene confidence was tested when seven minutes of added time were put on the board. They were, he says, “the longest minutes of my life”.
“I was just looking at the ref every two minutes, just waiting to see if he was ever going to blow the whistle. Then he finally did. It was mad, it was just amazing,” he says.
“The second that the whistle went I ran straight over to the Shels end. My dad and my brother were there, so I was looking for them in the stand. My brother came climbing down the steps and he ended up running on to the pitch and jumping on top of me. It was surreal.”
It’s natural that family was the first thing on Caffrey’s mind amid the chaos on the Brandywell astroturf. The 21-year-old comes from Shelbourne and Dublin football royalty.
Caffrey along with Gavin Molloy (who departed Shelbourne midway through their title charge for Aberdeen) are grandsons of Reds legend Theo Dunne who captained the 1960 FAI Cup-winning team, as well as leading Shels out in their Cup Winners’ Cup tie away to Barcelona in 1963.
Dunne’s son Thomas played for Shels across a four-year period, while his uncles, Bob and Paddy Thomas featured in Shels’ league winning campaign in 1928/29, with Bob also going on to manage the Reds to another league crown in 1952/53.
Outside of the Shels bubble, Caffrey is also a second cousin of Republic of Ireland legend Richard Dunne.
Being part of such a bloodline could add pressure, but Caffrey doesn’t see it that way. He’s always been determined to forge his own path, and in doing so contribute to the shared legacy.
“I think sometimes, for me, definitely, you can get sick of hearing things about what other people have done in the family, and you want to go out and create your own bit of history. And I think we have that now, so it’s kind of nice to then mash them all up together,” he says.
“My aunty still has my grandad’s league medal, so when we got ours, I brought it down to the house, and we were just looking at the two of them side by side. It’s just an amazing thing for us to have as a family, for him to have won it with the same club as his two grandsons. It’s brilliant, it’s really special.”
Celebrating with his family in the moment’s following title victory was instinctive for Caffrey, but his thoughts also quickly went to those supporters who stormed the pitch in celebration.
“I can only imagine what it means to some people, considering the dark days that the club went through over the last number of years. I‘d say it meant the world to those fans,” he says.
As a former Rovers prospect from Tallaght, it is perhaps unsurprising that Caffrey grew up as a passionate Hoops supporter. He too knew lean times as a fan.
“I remember it felt like such a long period when Dundalk and Cork were dominating. I was wondering then if Rovers were ever going to bleeding win the league, so I can at least understand that part from a fan’s point of view,” he says.
The Rovers fandom has certainly been put on hold for the time being. Caffrey recently told the Signature Fire Protection podcast that during the off season he took some pleasure in eliciting the odd dirty look from passers-by as he walked his dog through the streets of Tallaght while donning his Shelbourne Champions tee.
Now that the new season is here, however, Duff and his staff will not let the players rest on their achievements. That was the past. The future is now.
“Anyone can win one title. It’s about going out and doing it again. That’s the hard part,” Caffrey says.
“The message is the same, we’ve got to go out there and play the same way and win it again.
“I think everyone’s heads have kind of forgotten about winning the league. Everyone’s focus now is on the new season. Last year is in the past now. We had our celebrations, whatever. Now it’s back to work. Now we’ve been back on the pitch working hard and we’re ready to go again this year.”
Friday – Shelbourne v Derry City, 7.45pm. Live on Virgin Media 2.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
Damien Duff Evan Caffrey Interview League of Ireland Shelbourne Soccer