Longest successful club/county career?

zmccomish

Which player has had the longest successful county/club career?We followers probably know of players who have played up to 20 years at inter county level, but many of these players had not got a lot of mileage in their legs and their county was often knocked out in the early rounds. I am thinking of players whose counties/clubs were regularly successful-winning All Irelands, provincial /national league titles and played regularly at top level.

tippman26

Brendan Cummins-since 94,2 all irelands,5 munster and 2 leagues.
Won alot of divisional intermediate titles with his club(think 5 in a row at one stage)before they went senior(not the right way though).
Played football with tipp from 93 to 2002(i think) and won a county senior football title with his club in 2005.
still playing county hurling and playing football and hurling with his club.

Always_Running

Oisín McConville at 37 still playing away with Crossmaglen. 1993 to present 16 Armagh titles,9 Ulster titles, 6 All Ireland's. He retired from inter county football in 2008 after winning 7 Ulster titles,NFL and All Ireland.

Syferus

zmccomish wrote: »

Which player has had the longest successful county/club career?We followers probably know of players who have played up to 20 years at inter county level, but many of these players had not got a lot of mileage in their legs and their county was often knocked out in the early rounds. I am thinking of players whose counties/clubs were regularly successful-winning All Irelands, provincial /national league titles and played regularly at top level.

Really? Like who? That's an incredibly strange thing to say anyways, the vast majority of the year's physical work, training and games for any team is done by the time the first championship game rolls around.

Dermot Earley played senior from 1965 to 1985, and even played junior, minor, u21 and senior inter-county one year. Plenty of mileage on the legs of someone who won five Connact titles, an NFL, underage and club titles and of course played in the 1980 All-Ireland Final.

Damien Martin played for Offaly from 1964 to 1986 and although he was a keeper that is an incredible achievement in itself, he was of course also an All-Star and a double All-Ireland winner.

I could think of more of the top of my head but we'd be here a very long time.

nice_guy80

Mickey Linden
1982 - 2003

Mountainlad

The criteria is more than a little vague, so I'm just gonna say Shefflin, for winning 9 all-irelands and 11 all-stars and two (?) player of the year awards. Definitely the longest 'succesful' career.

If you're talking about impressive longevity at the highest level Tony Browne is another worth mentioning.

lala88

Niall Cahalane played club football for almost 25 years i think, was into his 40's when he retired. Christy Ring was well into his 40's as well.

Christy Walsh from Kerry played hurling with Kerry in the 80's and 90's and was still playing club hurling with Kilmoyley till he was well into his 40's, was 42/43 i think when he won his first county championship with them

Mountainlad

What about that 70 year old lad from Kerry who was playing club hurling a few years ago?

lala88

Mountainlad wrote: »

What about that 70 year old lad from Kerry who was playing club hurling a few years ago?

Was just going to post that. Played 50 years after he won a county championship!

mickmackey1

Denis Walsh of Tipp won the AI in 1895 and again in 1916 - the longest span ever.

klairondavis

Anthony Rainbow made his Kildare debut in 1990 and retired from intercounty football at the end of 2010. He's still playing club football with Suncroft.

Liam Miley who played for Kildare in the late eighties and early nineties is still playing for the St Laurences' reserves at the age of 52. He scored 5 points when they won the Senior Reserve C Championship Final earlier this year.

mccarthy37

Tony Browne is still going strong and he played his first senior game for Waterford way back in '92. We're all wondering will he pack it in this year or will he give it one more shot.

hawkwing

tippman26 wrote: »

Brendan Cummins-since 94,2 all irelands,5 munster and 2 leagues.
Won alot of divisional intermediate titles with his club(think 5 in a row at one stage)before they went senior(not the right way though).
Played football with tipp from 93 to 2002(i think) and won a county senior football title with his club in 2005.
still playing county hurling and playing football and hurling with his club.

He was in Australia on the day of the county final in 2005 ...

goose2005

Christy Ring was on the Cork team 23 years and won hurler of the year in 1959 aged 38. (I don't know if he deserved it or if it was more like Al Pacino in "scent of a Woman" winning the Oscar)

Deise Tom

Few if any could compare with former Mount Sion and Waterford hurler Mick Flannelly.

I stand to be corrected, but by my count his record reads:

15 county senior hurling, (played in 3 other finals).
3 minor hurling,
4 senior football
3 junior football.
He also captained Waterford to win a Minor All-Ireland minor hurling title in 1948.
He won three Munster Senior Hurling finals
1 National League title
1 All-Ireland senior final (played in '54, 59 drawn game and 63 finals as well)
1 Oireachtas Tournament (I think), Waterford won it in 1962.

toxicity234

Eugene Coughlan, Clareen in County Offaly,

Offaly senior inter-county team from 1977 until 1990.
Leinster titles 7
All Irelands 2
All Stars 2

Some guy Call Kevin Kinahan replaced him in both club and county (after a few years).

Club started playing Seinor in 1973 and finished in 2002,
won 4 County Titles 1988, 1995, 1996, 1998.

You have to remember that Seir Kieran (Clareen) is the second smallest club in the country.

WumBuster

goose2005 wrote: »

Christy Ring was on the Cork team 23 years and won hurler of the year in 1959 aged 38. (I don't know if he deserved it or if it was more like Al Pacino in "scent of a Woman" winning the Oscar)

Ring played championship hurling for Cork til he was 43. he won a munster club hurling with Glen Rovers as captain aged 45. Won his last county medal at 47. And he died aged 58 having only retired fully a few years previously.

''Hurling is a game of courage'' - Christy Ring

Dr Turk Turkelton

First thing Nelson Mandela was heard to say when he was released from prison-
Is Stephen King still playing for Cavan?

maroondog

Brian Whelehan had a very long career in modern era. Played 89-06 with Offaly, his club career no doubt was longer. He won everything, All Stars, picked on team of Millennium, 2 AIs, 4 Club AIs & a truck load of county titles.

Old_-_School

Dinny Allen won his first All-Ireland at the age of 37 (as captain), 17 years after his debut.
He lost 12 Munster Finals to Kerry.

jordainius

Between 1931 and 1948 Mick Mackey won 15 county senior titles and 5 county football titles with Ahane, 3 All-Ireland titles for Limerick and 5 National Hurling League and Munster titles. I believe his brother John and one or two other Ahane players also won everything above.

That Ahane team was hailed as the strongest club hurling team in the country by many (both inside and outside Limerick) and would most likely have won a few club All-Irelands had the competition existed back then.

Tom Joad

Cuchulainn1. wrote: »

First thing Nelson Mandela was heard to say when he was released from prison-
Is Stephen King still playing for Cavan?

Been a while since i heard that one!!

Stephen make his debut for Cavan in 1980, played international rules in 1987 and finally won an Ulster title in 1997 when he captained Cavan - a true legend and servant during some of the worst days for Cavan football - Cavan were knocked out of the championship in their first game 7 years running and yet he still soldiered on and carried the team..

J Cheever Loophole

Always_Running wrote: »

Oisín McConville at 37 still playing away with Crossmaglen. 1993 to present 16 Armagh titles,9 Ulster titles, 6 All Ireland's. He retired from inter county football in 2008 after winning 7 Ulster titles,NFL and All Ireland.

This - longevity married to success.

And if I may make a slight correction Always_Running, he now holds ten Ulster Club titles, along with Paul Hearty. Oisin is, in my opinion, one of the most influential club players of all time. His role on Sunday was as important then as his role was way back in December 1996, when a late goal beat Bellaghy in an Ulster Club Final replay in Clones, to win Rangers their first provincial title.

Legend.

mickmackey1

Always_Running wrote: »

16 Armagh titles

16??? that must be the record for county titles, one more than Mackey...amazing

cormac halpin

Tom Joad wrote: »

Been a while since i heard that one!!

Stephen make his debut for Cavan in 1980, played international rules in 1987 and finally won an Ulster title in 1997 when he captained Cavan - a true legend and servant during some of the worst days for Cavan football - Cavan were knocked out of the championship in their first game 7 years running and yet he still soldiered on and carried the team..

Some man to milk cows too.

LeoB

Hard to surpass Tony Browne. An incredible sportsman. On the Oisin McConville record was there a team in Mayo, Ballina I think who won an amazing amount of titles in a row? Maybe Oisin is after another title. He has a year or two left in him yet.

A lot of lads in Dublin football circles will remember a referee called Tom Ryan or "Tubber" as he was called in North Dublin.

Tom started playing with Pioneers in Balbriggan in 1948 and moved to St. Maurs Rush in 1952/3. Tom played junior for Dublin and in 1957 or 58 marked Mick O'Connell in a match, unsure of the details but possibly a Junior All-ireland semi-final in Austin Stack park. Tubber won a Dublin J.F.C Championship medal in 1972 and Intermediate in 1973. He played his last club game around 2000 for our 3rd team so he played in at least 6 decades and possibly 7. He still walks a good few miles every day. He would say he had a successful career because he played so long and enjoyed every minute of it. He would go anywhere if he thought he would get a game.

davegrohl48

The Mayo record you are referring to is probably Tooreen in hurling from the late 70's through to the early 2000's. Then Ballyhaunis got serious about their hurling and took some County titles. I think one of the Tooreen players had a record of Total County Titles plus County titles in a row. But for a lot of these titles they had only a few clubs to play against and were far superiour to the other clubs.