HE WILL BE in the colours of Antrim this evening, but things might have been different for Mark Doran if he had taken up an offer to be Derry’s manager at the end of 2024.
He was manager of Slaughtneil at that time. He was close to their leadership group of Brendan Rogers, Chrissy McKaigue and Shane McGuigan.
The three had shown up to his house one Christmas Eve when he was coach of Clare. They wanted him to double-job and take on Slaughtneil.
Yes, on Christmas Eve. If that sounds a bit extreme, then Doran is a man of extremes.
That hardly makes him stand out in Ulster football, however. But how else do you explain a man who was managing Ballybay in Monaghan and left to help coach with Colm Collins in Clare, has coached with Oisín McConville in Wicklow, and spent time in Roscommon as well as helping Paddy Tally in his native Down?
“It just didn’t feel right at the time,” says Doran of turning the Derry job down after some consideration.
“Make no mistake, in my eyes, Derry have the best man for the job.
“It was close enough but it just didn’t feel right and you have to go with your gut and that’s just it, but make no mistake I think Derry now, at last, have got the right man in and the best man for the job and a man I know very well.”
Travelling long distances in pursuit of coaching and management opportunities is nothing new and, indeed, becoming commonplace in the GAA.
Those working in education, as Doran does as a teacher in St Colman’s in Newry, appear to be able to manage it.
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He was in charge of Ballybay when he got a call one day from Clare manager Colm Collins.
He didn’t believe it at the time and even hung the phone up, believing it to be a prank. After the game, he had a message from Collins, confirming it really was him. He replied with the most obvious question.
How?
Down to Clare?
How?
Collins asked for a meeting. They arranged one for the Carrickdale Hotel in south Armagh.
“I don’t know if any of youse know Colm,” recalls Doran of that meeting.
“Very persuasive and within 10 minutes, there was a done deal without me knowing it was a done deal.
Coaching Down while under Paddy Tally. Bryan Keane / INPHO
Bryan Keane / INPHO / INPHO
At the start, it was just a Wednesday night session and the games at the weekend. Having gotten him hooked on the gateway drug, he soon had him mainlining the hard stuff.
“So my agreement was, I would come every Wednesday, and the McGrath Cup was a Sunday, or a league game, but then after three weeks, Colm rang me one day and said, ‘These boys want you doing more,’ so then you were down Wednesday, Friday, Sunday, and that was just it, you just had full control of training.
“Colm’s whole thing was, ‘Look Mark, this is my last year of managing Clare, we need to get to a Munster final. We haven’t been to a Munster final. We need to get to a Munster final.’
“And then we beat Cork that year in the semi-final. We beat Cork Easter Sunday, and that was the first time I think Clare had beat Cork in a Championship game in 63 years or so.”
He left Ballybay convinced he could not do both. That was until he had the visit on Christmas Eve from the Slaughtneil delegation.
He had his arm twisted sufficiently. His weeks soon became a blur.
Slaughtneil on Tuesday nights. Clare on a Wednesday. In Slaughtneil on a Thursday, Clare on a Friday, Slaughtneil on a Saturday and Clare on a Sunday, and it was just the fact it was Slaughtneil . . .
“People say to me, how do you do that, and I say, ‘Sure, you love it.’ If you’re doing something you love.”
At this point, Doran has coached county teams in every province: Roscommon in Connacht, Clare in Munster, Wicklow in Leinster, Down in Ulster and now managing Antrim.
“I felt then at the time it was nearly time to go. The next move was to maybe go into management and see was it a natural progress, and see was it a step,” he says.
“People say it’s a lot. Probably a lot more time on your phone, but I don’t think it’s any more time at work.
“Because I know the things I’ve been in Down or Roscommon, or Clare, you’re in it, like, and the one thing I’ve learned from Colm Collins, you would never know sitting at a table with Colm Collins, Colm’s a manager.
“You get four or five around the table, and it’s the one management team.”
Antrim play Donegal in the Dr McKenna Cup at Cargin. Leah Scholes / INPHO
Leah Scholes / INPHO / INPHO
That’s an approach he has taken with Antrim.
“There’s no head honcho. Everybody has a fair saying. You try and do what’s best for Antrim, so that’s how that’s how the whole thing ended up round with Antrim.”
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At the start of the year, questions were being asked after opening defeats to Carlow, Tipperary and a walloping from Longford to the tune of 1-14 to 1-27 in Portglenone.
Even at that, he will point to the 41 shots they got off in that game. They hit eight short into the keepers’ hands, missed four one-on-ones and watched as Longford had a super day from two-pointers, nailing six.
His policy of hard training at the start of the year, had a toll.
“I like training hard. I just think you have to train hard, I think even mentally, just character, robustness built up and I always had this in my head,” he says.
“If I walk into the changing room and see 10 or 12 boys on a physio table – (I say) ‘Get out and train.’ And to be fair we did train really, really hard and the boys would have told me it was the hardest they’d trained all year.
“Like Mark Jordan said in my time, it was the hardest I’ve ever trained but the only thing was a lot of boys were breaking down.
“They just weren’t used to that robustness but you would certainly hope in the next lot of weeks you would see, and to be fair I’d have to say in the last two or three weeks you have seen that in our league games where we are finishing strongly but it’s just a few weeks too late.”
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Mark Doran: The Antrim manager who has coached Clare, Roscommon, Wicklow and Down
HE WILL BE in the colours of Antrim this evening, but things might have been different for Mark Doran if he had taken up an offer to be Derry’s manager at the end of 2024.
He was manager of Slaughtneil at that time. He was close to their leadership group of Brendan Rogers, Chrissy McKaigue and Shane McGuigan.
The three had shown up to his house one Christmas Eve when he was coach of Clare. They wanted him to double-job and take on Slaughtneil.
Yes, on Christmas Eve. If that sounds a bit extreme, then Doran is a man of extremes.
That hardly makes him stand out in Ulster football, however. But how else do you explain a man who was managing Ballybay in Monaghan and left to help coach with Colm Collins in Clare, has coached with Oisín McConville in Wicklow, and spent time in Roscommon as well as helping Paddy Tally in his native Down?
“It just didn’t feel right at the time,” says Doran of turning the Derry job down after some consideration.
“Make no mistake, in my eyes, Derry have the best man for the job.
“It was close enough but it just didn’t feel right and you have to go with your gut and that’s just it, but make no mistake I think Derry now, at last, have got the right man in and the best man for the job and a man I know very well.”
Travelling long distances in pursuit of coaching and management opportunities is nothing new and, indeed, becoming commonplace in the GAA.
Those working in education, as Doran does as a teacher in St Colman’s in Newry, appear to be able to manage it.
He was in charge of Ballybay when he got a call one day from Clare manager Colm Collins.
He didn’t believe it at the time and even hung the phone up, believing it to be a prank. After the game, he had a message from Collins, confirming it really was him. He replied with the most obvious question.
How?
Down to Clare?
How?
Collins asked for a meeting. They arranged one for the Carrickdale Hotel in south Armagh.
“I don’t know if any of youse know Colm,” recalls Doran of that meeting.
“Very persuasive and within 10 minutes, there was a done deal without me knowing it was a done deal.
At the start, it was just a Wednesday night session and the games at the weekend. Having gotten him hooked on the gateway drug, he soon had him mainlining the hard stuff.
“So my agreement was, I would come every Wednesday, and the McGrath Cup was a Sunday, or a league game, but then after three weeks, Colm rang me one day and said, ‘These boys want you doing more,’ so then you were down Wednesday, Friday, Sunday, and that was just it, you just had full control of training.
“Colm’s whole thing was, ‘Look Mark, this is my last year of managing Clare, we need to get to a Munster final. We haven’t been to a Munster final. We need to get to a Munster final.’
“And then we beat Cork that year in the semi-final. We beat Cork Easter Sunday, and that was the first time I think Clare had beat Cork in a Championship game in 63 years or so.”
He left Ballybay convinced he could not do both. That was until he had the visit on Christmas Eve from the Slaughtneil delegation.
He had his arm twisted sufficiently. His weeks soon became a blur.
“People say to me, how do you do that, and I say, ‘Sure, you love it.’ If you’re doing something you love.”
At this point, Doran has coached county teams in every province: Roscommon in Connacht, Clare in Munster, Wicklow in Leinster, Down in Ulster and now managing Antrim.
“I felt then at the time it was nearly time to go. The next move was to maybe go into management and see was it a natural progress, and see was it a step,” he says.
“People say it’s a lot. Probably a lot more time on your phone, but I don’t think it’s any more time at work.
“Because I know the things I’ve been in Down or Roscommon, or Clare, you’re in it, like, and the one thing I’ve learned from Colm Collins, you would never know sitting at a table with Colm Collins, Colm’s a manager.
“You get four or five around the table, and it’s the one management team.”
That’s an approach he has taken with Antrim.
“There’s no head honcho. Everybody has a fair saying. You try and do what’s best for Antrim, so that’s how that’s how the whole thing ended up round with Antrim.”
At the start of the year, questions were being asked after opening defeats to Carlow, Tipperary and a walloping from Longford to the tune of 1-14 to 1-27 in Portglenone.
Even at that, he will point to the 41 shots they got off in that game. They hit eight short into the keepers’ hands, missed four one-on-ones and watched as Longford had a super day from two-pointers, nailing six.
His policy of hard training at the start of the year, had a toll.
“I like training hard. I just think you have to train hard, I think even mentally, just character, robustness built up and I always had this in my head,” he says.
“If I walk into the changing room and see 10 or 12 boys on a physio table – (I say) ‘Get out and train.’ And to be fair we did train really, really hard and the boys would have told me it was the hardest they’d trained all year.
“Like Mark Jordan said in my time, it was the hardest I’ve ever trained but the only thing was a lot of boys were breaking down.
“They just weren’t used to that robustness but you would certainly hope in the next lot of weeks you would see, and to be fair I’d have to say in the last two or three weeks you have seen that in our league games where we are finishing strongly but it’s just a few weeks too late.”
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