James McCarthy Dublin

A forum to air your views on Offaly GAA matters and beyond.
ryot
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Re: James McCarthy Dublin

Post by ryot »

McIntyre on the Kerry minor team a couple of years ago:

Grandson of PJ who played both football & hurling for Rynaghs & Offaly ( and later played both for Kerry) ?? PJ was a Garda in Kenmare and one son was also a Garda, who died in road accident....

Niall Claffey, Birr/Offaly hurler was a nephew of PJ.....

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Re: James McCarthy Dublin

Post by Bord na Mona man »

ryot wrote:Regarding Kevin Heffernan:::

I was always told as a child that Kevin Heffernan was actually born in Offaly (Tullamore maternity Unit ??) and would be very aggressive when it was mentioned to him,,,,

He had an intense dislike to that being discussed,,,,,,,,,,,, Was his Dad actually stationed in Portarlington at some stage ?? That was mentioned somewhere and was his mother not also Offaly ??
Kevin Heffernan had a big dislike for culchies, so it might go some way towards explaining it.

SearingDrive
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Re: James McCarthy Dublin

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His mother was from Kilkenny. I never heard he was born in Tullamore. He had a thing about Offaly,despite his father's origins.

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Re: James McCarthy Dublin

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Bord na Mona man wrote:
ryot wrote:Regarding Kevin Heffernan:::

I was always told as a child that Kevin Heffernan was actually born in Offaly (Tullamore maternity Unit ??) and would be very aggressive when it was mentioned to him,,,,

He had an intense dislike to that being discussed,,,,,,,,,,,, Was his Dad actually stationed in Portarlington at some stage ?? That was mentioned somewhere and was his mother not also Offaly ??
Kevin Heffernan had a big dislike for culchies, so it might go some way towards explaining it.
Didn't a former Dublin footballer, Paddy Henry, have a Clara father, Gene Henry? Clara's John O'Hara, was a former Dublin minor, with an Offaly father.

dubbiff
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Re: James McCarthy Dublin

Post by dubbiff »

David Henry played for Dublin and I think his uncle is Vincent Henry from the 1982 team. Also Ciaran Kilkenny's mother is an Offaly woman but I cannot remember where she hails from.

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Re: James McCarthy Dublin

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dubbiff wrote:David Henry played for Dublin and I think his uncle is Vincent Henry from the 1982 team. Also Ciaran Kilkenny's mother is an Offaly woman but I cannot remember where she hails from.
Thanks for correction re David Henry. Vincent Henry, former Offaly player is his uncle.

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Re: James McCarthy Dublin

Post by Bord na Mona man »

That's correct, David Henry is a son of Gene Henry, nephew of Vincent Henry and a cousin of Shane Lowry.

John McCarthy is married to an Offaly woman.

In 1989 David Walsh wrote a huge piece in Magill magazine profiling the Dublin team.
Here is the piece about John McCarthy (James was born in 1990 btw)

15. John McCarthy
To the lads, he was macker Courageous, outrageous, likeable but never clever. In the team of engineers and doctors, entrepreneurs and executives, solicitor and publican, schoolteacher and economist, Macker was a guard. More than that, he wanted to be nothing else. As the team grew, ambitions grew. On and off the field. The thing about Macker was that his ambition was like his football jersey: only in evidence on match days.
One of his team mates says Macker disproved the belief that "the rising tide will lift every boat". Macker was the only member of the team not to receive an All Star award and when it was reported that a Dublin All Ireland medal was being auctioned, people thought it must be Macker. A reporter from the Irish Independent turned up at his home: "Was it you Macker?" Many of the other players enquired of Macker: "did you speak with Macker yet?"
The interview with John McCarthy was the most honest. most entertaining of all. Macker reckoned he could tell all in about fifteen minutes. Sure it felt like fifteen minutes but the interview lasted nine hours. In the deluge that carried pieces of his life, the insights cut close to the heart of the team and right through the heart of Macker himself: At the beginning he idolized Heffernan. Would have done anything for the man. A few things happened, Macker lost his innocence and his awe of Heffernan. By the time Macker finished with Dublin in 1984, the wheel had gone full circle: "If Heffernan was walking down the street I think I'd cross to the other side. You have to respect what he did with the Dublin team but he lacked the ability to be human."

Macker got nervous in the build-up to big games. He would not sleep well the night before and he was, in his own words, "an unbearable b*****d", on the morning of the match.
By the time Macker got to the dressing room, he was a wreck. Before one match Heffernan asked his players which one of them was going to be "the Judas in this game".
The notion of betraying the team fed the demons which raged inside Macker: "Heffernan was a great motivator but he motivated through fear. His pre-match stuff went over the top. It almost cracked me. God, we were amateur sportsmen. And, then, when Heffernan considered you were of no further use you were kicked out, forgotten. Remember Andy Roche. It was, I think, a League quarter final against Mayo in 1979. He was supposed to be successor to Kevin Moran. "During that game the ball bounced in front of the Mayo goal, Andy could not miss but somehow he contrived to put it wide. We ended up losing by a point or two. If Andy had scored we would have won. That evening Tommy Drumm and I were having a drink with Andy and Heffernan walked into the bar. He looked at Tommy, 'howya Tommy', at me "howya Macker". He stared at Andy but never said a word. "On the Tuesday evening he rang Andy and told him not to come to training. He was not part of the squad anymore. Normally Heffernan did not tell the person himself but I reckoned he felt so annoyed with Andy that he wanted to actually inform him himself.
"You could say to Heffernan that I said he was not a humanitarian and he could say humanitarians do not win All Irelands. He could be right but we also won under Hanahoe and I felt more comfortable with him than I did with Heffernan. I would have been happier if Hanahoe had stayed in charge."

Macker's earliest memories are of walking down Cappagh Road in Finglas West with his kit. The lads on the street would ask "was he still playin' that gah?" Macker used to avoid giving a straight answer "ah no, I'm just off to an auld game". In the Dublin of the early seven- ties, teenagers did not want to be seen playing Gaelic. The boys on Cappagh Road could not understand why Macker still played "that gah".
First match for Dublin was in the 1973 Championship, the second round replay against Louth. Macker met Phil Markey, the then team manager, in the Sunnybank Hotel sometime after the drawn match. Markey asked McCarthy would he be interested in playing the replay. Down at Parnell Park on the following Tuesday evening there were seven or eight guys training. Three of them actually played against Louth in the replay. That was how things were in 1973.
When the wagon rolled in 1974, Macker was aboard. Converted by Heffernan from wing back to corner forward. In later years he would look around and notice the group: the professional men and the entrepreneurs, the big cars and the improving addresses. It unnerved him a little. Macker was never sure of himself and chose to hide behind a macho mask.
To some of the guys, it appeared that Macker wanted to answer every question through physical combat: "I lacked self belief in some ways, not in others. I knew I was as courageous as anybody on the team. No matter what happened I would go in and put my neck on the line." Yet to those who grew close to him, Macker was great. David Hickey was his special friend. Macker's second son is called David, after Hickey.
Between them, they raised hell: "I swear", says Macker, "the only harm we did was to ourselves". "I don't think everybody would go along with that", says Bobby Doyle but, from the lips of Macker, you want to believe.
Hanahoe's memory is of Hickey loading the gun and Macker joyously pulling the trigger. A decade on, Macker's affection for Hickey remain deep: "Dave had outrageous belief in himself. He could get away with things that nobody else could. Heffernan thought the world of Dave. "People were shocked to see that Dave and I got on so well. Some fellows used to think Hickey a snob, he was anything but. Once the games ended, we knew how to celebrate. Hickey could draw the worst out in me but we had some times. Before he went off to Pennsylvania last summer, himself, myself and Anton got together for a booze-up. Great night." On the field Macker survived on the strength of his athleticism. He was strong, fast and always fit. With the hand pass, he was a finisher.

"As he digs me he says 'I'm Mickey Joe Forbes the hardest wee mon in Ulster, hit me, hit."
Never, ever did Macker mind going there was danger. His right jaw was twice broken and once he had four teeth smashed. Each time Macker was heading for goal. Each time he thought he would hold a grudge against the opponent. When he had his teeth smashed, he vowed to hold a grudge. But grudges are beyond Macker. He remembers what Liam Fardy (Wexford), Danny Culligan (Louth) and Denis Dalton (Kildare) did to him but there is now no malice in his recollections. His memories contain more laughs than laments. The Mickey Joe Forbes episode is his favorite. It was a League semi-final against Tyrone at Croke Park, 1978. Macker was marked by a small corner back who punched him during the playing of the national anthem:
"As he digs me he says 'I'm Mickey Joe Forbes, the hardest wee mon in Ulster, hit me, hit me'. I look at him, he is much smaller than me and I know that if I touch him I'm going to get sent off. The game starts, he keeps hitting, all the time repeating 'I'm Mickey Joe Forbes, the hardest wee mon in Ulster, hit me, hit me.'
"It is beginning to get to me because this guy never stops hitting. So I go towards the Dublin dug out and ask what should I do. I am told to keep running, not to get involved. We had a general policy in the team that if my man was messing me, another Dublin player would sort him out. Mullins could see things on the pitch that others never noticed.
"He got the ball and started soloing. Mickey Joe Forbes, the hardest wee mon in Ulster, was in his path. Mullins kept going. I don't know what happened but Mickey Joe went down. There wasn't a stir. As he was being taken off I wanted to run over and say 'now Mickey Joe Forbes, the hardest wee mon in Ulster, you have just met the hardest wee mon in Leinster.'" Garda John McCarthy works out of Mountjoy.

Phibsboro is his beat. He knows the people up there, they know him. Decent working class people, he says. He is married to Marianne, a County Offaly woman, and they have three boys; Cal (14), David (13) and Barry (3). The lads on the team believed that Marianne saved John McCarthy from Macker:
"There is a lot in that," says Macker. "But Keaveney always told us, marry a culchie. They are far more understanding than city girls. Marianne is easy going and tolerant. She has a beauty salon up on Vernon Avenue in Clontarf. She likes the Clontarf people."

Macker's family were on his mind as he was rushed by police car to the Richmond Hospital in February, 1984. He wore a maroon jumper. Down the front of the jumper on the left side, the jumper was a darker color as blood flowed from a wound centimeters below the heart: "As a guard I'd seen a guy die within five minutes from this kind of cut. I did not want to die, life is precious. I didn't want to leave a wife and kids."
Earlier that evening Macker had been playing darts at Bohemians football club in Phibsboro. On his way home he walked to the Chinese Takeaway to get a curry for Marianne. Inside there was a group of four or five who noticed Macker's presence. One was a blonde-haired woman.
Somebody said "that's a pig out of the Bridewell". Macker pretended not to notice. The fat woman approached Macker and said "I know you, you're a pig from the Bridewell". She then spat at Macker. He refused to react. She spat again and still he did nothing: "Then a small fellow came over and hit me. I floored him and the others joined in. The woman took off her high heel, I remember a voice in the background telling me to watch the knife but I never saw it. It was probably a flick knife.
"In a few seconds it was allover. As they ran out I saw blood stains on the wall and felt a bit hot but did not realize that I had been stabbed. I ran out after them and got the number of their car. By this I knew I had a cut and I asked the Chinese guy to call the guards.
"The people who attacked me were caught within an hour and three of them were sent to prison. I have seen them since and have spoken to all except the fellow who stabbed me. I saw him once, he was riding a bike. When he saw me he slowed as if he was afraid to come in my direction. I just laughed to myself. If I met him I'd be calm, what's the point in being anything else. One day I was on duty at the Special Criminal Court when a woman came over and gave me a bag of chips, 'I got you some chips,' she said. It was the same woman who was in the Takeaway that night. "The knife went downwards into my skin, if it had gone upwards I would have died. In the hospital that night one doctor whispered to another that I had been lucky and I knew I was. The next morning I was attended by my favorite doctor, Dr. Hickey." Macker says he was not the one to sell the All Ireland medal: "I suppose it was logical that people would think it was me. "I mean if you went through the team you would, by a process of elimination, arrive at me. The others are pretty well heeled blokes. I have no regard for medals, they are something which might be of use when you are at the rocking chair stage but I did not sell one."
You could meet Garda John McCarthy on duty in Croke Park on a Sunday afternoon. He looks at the matches but feels no hankering for big time football again. He still turns out for Ballymun Kickhams senior team and that involvement is as much as he seeks. Thirty five years of age, just three pounds heavier than when he played for the Dubs, Macker says he could not be happier:

"I never had the ambition that the other lads had. No push. In foot ball it was different. I wanted to win there. But I am as happy as anybody. All I wanted was a wife and a few kids and enough money to buy food and a jar. I don't want to live in Howth or own a big car."
On his days off you might find Macker at Fairyhouse races. If it is Saturday he will back a few and watch them race on television. He hopes that Piggott will become a great trainer and go on to train Derby winners: "When he was in jail a lot of people disowned Lester, if he wins big as a trainer they will come back and try to be his friends again. I would love to see Lester tell them where to get off."

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Re: James McCarthy Dublin

Post by Bord na Mona man »

SearingDrive wrote:His mother was from Kilkenny. I never heard he was born in Tullamore. He had a thing about Offaly,despite his father's origins.
Being a St Vincent's club man would have fed into this.
In Heffernan's era, the club was very rigid in pursuing a Dubliners only policy. There was ructions in the club when they voted to relax the rule and allow Ciaran Barr from Antrim transfer in. Several members resigned and swore never to return.

LooseCannon
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Re: James McCarthy Dublin

Post by LooseCannon »

Has anyone else found any other intercounty or former intercounty players with Offaly parentage, or even grandparentage?
Good Luck

maccie
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Re: James McCarthy Dublin

Post by maccie »

Number of lads playing senior football in Clane(Kildare) with Offaly born parenst, Brian McLoughlin (Forward,Captain Leinster Minor 2016),dad from Birr, Tom Connor (Ex Kildare FF),dad from Walsh Island, Brian Corbett(good club corner back),mam from Ballyfore. All of these lads are eligible to play for Offaly under division 3 and 4 concession.

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