AT AROUND 9AM, the rain came down on Tyrone on Saturday. An hour later, it was coming from a sideways angle at those poor unfortunate dads and mums that foolishly brought their children to underage coaching.
All morning, all lunchtime and all afternoon, it kept up. The sensible people in Tyrone and Monaghan lit the fire and relied on TG4. The zealots headed for the match. 3,500 or so of them.
By 5.30pm and entrance to Healy Park, it had decimated the premier ground of Tyrone GAA. In times of rain, Healy Park is left treacherous and dangerous. One steward had taken to scooping water out of the goalmouth with a bucket and throwing it two yards in either direction.
Other volunteers were out with the mopping machines. Some even had leaf blowers and blowing the water into a steam that ultimately fell again. On each 45 metre line, the puddles were substantial.
A perfect stage then, for a do-or-die relegation battle between two neighbours that are sick looking at each other by now, but neither prepared to concede an inch while locked in their permanent struggle.
To take care of the bottom line at this point, Tyrone won. Monaghan lost. That leaves Monaghan in Division 2 next year. While some of their support gloried in their Great Escape acts of recent times, their manager Vinny Corey was much more pragmatic about it all afterwards.
“It’s not something I would be overly sentimental about, to be honest,” Corey said.
“I think we treaded the line a few times. If I had have known the setbacks we were going to have, we would have taken Division 2 this year. But I don’t think Division 2 is a bad place for where Monaghan is right now to build and get a bit of momentum.”
Both teams came locked and loaded. Corey called on his clubmate of many, many years in Conor McManus to make his first start of the year. Tyrone boss Brian Dooher reached for Cathal McShane who had been more or less kept in cold storage from last year.
McManus has shown what it is to be one of the best forwards in the game. McShane flickered once or twice. With different luck, you wouldn’t know what he might have been. But he has time.
The past was theirs. The future is Darragh Canavan’s. For now, they all share the present.
Given the conditions we outline extensively here, it was therefore remarkable to witness the contest and quality of football played in Omagh. You could very easily take that sort of thing for granted.
If there was ever a play that showed just how ruthless this level of football is, it came in the 27th minute. A ball was played across the Tyrone defensive cordon to Darren Hughes and as he tried to bounce the ball it stuck to the surface.
With a defender streaming in, Hughes actually ducked the tackle in picking the ball up again and let go of a shot with nothing of his customary gusto.
Instead of letting it dribble wide, Red Hands goalkeeper Niall Morgan ran out and retrieved it, before letting go with a long kick downfield to Canavan.
With Miceál Bannigan giving chase, there was no stopping Canavan who carried it in, lost control with the surface, but still rattled the net to make it 1-9 to 1-2.
Morgan and Canavan are Tyrone’s heart now. But they are cute too. When Monaghan scored their goal after five minutes through Jack McCarron, Morgan took the sting out of their momentum by remaining on the ground for a couple of minutes. Momentum stallers is a dirty secret of the GAA, one that few will acknowledge.
Two early Tyrone points brought the gap out to seven points. At that point, Conor McManus produced twenty minutes of genius that produced five scores.
A quick sideline ball to Jack McCarron also was smacked off the post. An Andrew Woods sprint through the middle had a supporting run from Killian Lavelle that ended with the latter punching a goal home.
At 36, we will say goodbye to McManus as a footballer soon. What an incredible career it has been. But there’s still a bit to go yet.
“He hasn’t had a lot of gametime in the league and he needed the game today because we are only three weeks out from the championship,” said Corey on his Clontibret clubmate.
“So he got a good full game. You could see the rustiness at the start but as the game wore on you could see his quality. It’s very encouraging for the year ahead. I think you still wonder if he can do it, but he proved it today.”
If Monaghan beat Cavan in the preliminary round of Ulster, these two will meet back here in the Ulster quarter-final. Last year the exact same fixture produced a Monaghan win with a Ryan O’Toole goal in practically the final play.
In a few years’ time, nobody will recall the filthy night in Omagh with the small crowd and the gluepot pitch. But this was a classic to behold.
And we’re hopeful for one more on 21 April.
