TWELVE years after the Derry minors lost their All-Ireland semi-final to Cork in controversial circumstances, Damien Canning was surprised to be discussing the intricacies of the game while working in Cardiff.

He had met a colleague from Wales who turned out to be a passionate fan of Gaelic games owing to the fact that his father was Irish. The pair spent their downtime from work discussing Gaelic football, and one day the man brought up the story of the All-Ireland Minor semi-final of 2000 when a Cork team saw their midfielder receive two yellow cards but wasn’t sent off and they went on to beat Derry.

Imagine the Cardiff man’s surprise when he discovered that Damien Canning was playing in that very game.

“Randomly one day he mentioned that story of the Cork team playing the Derry team. We chatted for a long time about that and then I told him I was involved. It was so odd, he knew that story.

“You forget that it was such a big talking point at the time. My wife heard of that story. She’s not a big football fan. But she heard of the minor team that didn’t have justice because of a lad staying on for two yellow cards.”

And 20 years on from that game, that’s probably what most people who have Ulster leanings will remember, a Derry team that lost an All-Ireland semi-final.

But that’s far from the only remarkable aspect of that Derry minor team.

What made that team so special was that they managed to beat some of the very best teams in Ulster, sides that included a Down All-Ireland winning squad led by the great Benny Coulter.

They defeated a Cavan team spearheaded by Ireland u-17 international rules players Nicholas Walsh. And then in the final they stopped a Tyrone side that included the great Sean Cavanagh, who’d won a Hogan Cup with St Patrick’s, Armagh.

Canning said: “That minor team was a great bunch of lads. There were lads there who were real honest people. There were no Maradonas. We were good players who clicked.”

They weren’t average though. Ciaran O’Neill, Kevin McCann and Jim Kelly had won College Allstars the year before.

The team had Philip Mooney, Colm Feeny and Marty O’Kane in full-back. Sean McKenna was the captain, and played half-back with his clubmate from Glen, Gary McMaster. Chris Collins and Stephen Scullion shared centre half-back duties. Midfield tended to be a partnership of Damien Canning and Kevin McCann. Up front, they had a great line up of forwards that included Gavin Donaghy, Marty Donaghy, Ciaran O’Neill, Jim Kelly, Paul Hearty and Paul Young. They also had class players on the squad including Barry McGuigan.

Ciaran O’Neill said: “I thought that that team was brilliant, and that we should have won the All-Ireland.”

Earlier that year, the Maghera contingent on the team had lost to St Pat’s, Armagh by a point in extra-time of a replay.

O’Neill said: “We had got beat by St Pat’s, Armagh, and they went on to win the Hogan. They beat us by a point after extra-time. That knocked the stuffing out of us.”

The Derry captain in 2000 was Sean McKenna, and he agreed.

“We underperformed in the MacRory. We had a class team with Fergal Doherty. We got beat by St Pat’s, Armagh in the quarter-final in a replay after extra-time. Ronan Clarke and Sean Cavanagh were on that team.

“But we were confident because we were always in good Maghera teams.”

Yet Maghera was not the foundation for the Derry minors, according to McKenna.

He said: “I don’t think Maghera created the spine. The people who came in, Damien Canning and Feeny were at the middle of the craic. We wouldn’t have known of them. It was a weird mix. But it worked.”

The championship began with a game against Cavan.

McKenna said: “We knew Cavan would be tight. But we were always confident that we could beat Down, and confident that we could beat Tyrone.”

Ciaran O’Neill said: “Cavan was our hardest game. Marty Donaghy got a fisted goal to win it. After that we were confident.”

That set up a semi-final with the All-Ireland champions Down.

Sean McKenna said: “They had Benny Coulter playing. They had Ronan Murtagh. Boys like that.

“We had all eyes on Benny Coulter. He was midfield. We watched the tapes and there were a lot of goals in him.

“We had to be wary of that. They put him in full-forward in the second half. All the balls went in to him. We just had to keep a tight eye on him. And collectively defend against him.

“We knew if we did, our defence could get the ball over the halfway line, and when we did that we got it to the forwards and they were all scoring. We had to get the ball to them and they would do the business.

“There was no system for Benny. We just knew what he was capable of.

“If the goal was on he was going to go for it, you had to be prepare for that. We just couldn’t give him any space. He was the best forward in Ireland.”

Ciaran O’Neill remembers the plan for Coulter.

He said: “We put Kevin McCann on Benny. We knew ‘Dodger’ could mark anybody. Benny didn’t score a pile.

“Once we nullified him we had a great chance of beating them.”

The Down game was the key match to the Ulster Championship success.

Sean McKenna said: “I can remember Benny Coulter’s speech after we beat them, all he said to us go and win the All-Ireland.”

That win gave them the confidence ahead of the Ulster final.

Damien Canning said: “We never looked at anyone and thought that they were better than us. We felt we could be as good as we could be. We thought, ‘why wouldn’t we be able to beat them?’

“We felt that we had a strong panel. Nobody felt any better or special than anyone else.

“I felt that there was trust in each other. Everybody was trying hard.”

They had beaten the best, and they had the game-plan to win.

Ciaran O’Neill set the scene for the final:

“The final was some experience. Derry were playing Armagh in the senior game after us. A massive crowd.

“I should have got the line after 30 seconds. I put in a challenge for the ball and I put the elbow up. He let me away with a yellow. It was tight game.”

They were up against a Tyrone team that had Sean Cavanagh.

Sean McKenna said: “I remember watching Tyrone’s semi-final, you could see Sean Cavanagh when he got the ball he was trying to go through the middle. I remember worrying about that. But it was the same as Coulter, we just had to cover that.

“I remember the game was in the balance. There was a point in to it. The ball broke and Sean Cavanagh ran on to the ball. Me and Colm Feeny managed to get a hand on him.

“I remember then the next point. We walked it up the field and went two points up. Then we won the kick-out and it was three points up.

“If he had got that point it would have been a drawn game.”

Ciaran O’Neill said: “Cormac O’Neill and Paul Young’s goals won it for us. Cormac O’Neill’s goal in the second half in particular.

“We were under pressure and Cormac went through and put it in the bottom corner. We didn’t look like losing after that.”

The celebrations began and the whole team went to the Greenvale.

Sean McKenna said: “There was a good crowd of boys stayed at my dad’s house. The north Derry boys. It was great..”

But then they turned their attention to the All-Ireland semi-final with Cork.

Sean McKenna said: “What everyone remembers is the midfielder (Kieran Murphy) got a yellow card for kicking me. In the second half he got another yellow card for a rugby tackle. He caught three or four kick-outs after that.”

Damien Canning said: “We could have beat them if that guy had went off. There was an All-Ireland in us.

“If Derry had have had an All-Ireland in 2000 and 2002. That hand wasn’t dealt to us, that would have been a stepping stone to a senior team.”

Ciaran O’Neill said: “We had played Mayo in a friendly a couple of weeks prior and we beat them easy. Cork went on and hammered Mayo.

“I hit the post for a goal, if that went in we won.

“The referee didn’t help things. The man who got two yellows caught two kick-outs. Noel O’Leary split Gavin Donaghy. You need them calls to go your way.”

Losing Donaghy was arguably more important than the yellow card issue.

Sean McKenna said: “Gavin Donaghy was very important for our team. He was the link man. He was always available for the ball. I remember in the All-Ireland semi-final he got split. He is that fit, and was always available. He would take it off us and get it forward.

“Ciaran O’Neill had a good chance for the goal but hit the post. In the second half they were stronger.”

In the aftermath of the game, the media talked about a replay. The Derry management planned for the possibility but it never came.

Ciaran O’Neill said: “Every time I meet Chris Brown and he says the same thing to me every time ‘that’s the one that got away’. He felt that he had the team to do it. We did too. That day against Cork didn’t go our way.”

In the aftermath, many of the players didn’t play any more football. A few, like Gavin Donaghy and Jim Kelly, had county careers. But not as many as would be expected.

Two years later, Derry won the All-Ireland Minor final under Chris Brown. The manager tried to get the 2000 team on the bus.

Sean McKenna said: “He wanted all our minors to come on and get on the bus. I was in Belfast. Chris Brown grabbed them from the street and got them on the bus to celebrate with the team. I was happy.

“I think at the time I was thinking that I didn’t want to crowd their party, but I was in Belfast. If I had have been there I would have jumped on.”

Two years later Mickey Moran took the u-21s but opted not to use the core of the 2000 minor team.

Ciaran O’Neill said: “Belfast was sore on a lock of us.

“The carry on and wrecking about caught up with us. You get away with that when you are 17. Not many played with the county but some were successful with their club.

“I can’t explain why more didn’t go on. There were six or seven that flirted with the county at McKenna Cup. Donaghy and Jim Kelly played a bit. I know the lifestyle we were leading didn’t lend itself to senior football.”

However, the three men who were interviewed agree that it was the partying that they did in 2000 that helped that team win.

Damian Canning said: “There were days of the game when you couldn’t have waited to get the match over for the big party afterwards.

“We did stay together after matches. We would go out and have the craic, and then the next day get back at it.

“It’s completely different now, It is more disciplined. Maybe if you do enjoy it you get different rewards.”

Ciaran O’Neill agrees: “You enjoyed going up to Owenbeg to train for the craic. The craic us lads had that year was unbelievable.

“Charlie O’Kane (part of management), we reckoned, had a spy around the Elk and Toomebridge every Saturday night because he was fit to tell us who the lads courted and how many beers you had. He knew everything.”

Sean McKenna said: “The craic element came from the management. We had Chris Brown, Paddy Crozier, Aidan O’Brien, Bernie Henry and Charlie O’Kane. All them boys were good craic. They all had role.

“It makes it a lot easier to go up to Owenbeg to have people that you can have fun with.

“We did love going out with each other. There was a good buzz about training.”

Ciaran O’Neill said: “There is never football mentioned when we meet up. It is always about the Greenvale on the Sunday night. The craic was on the bus after the match. Big Ruairi Convery doing the snake.

“Donaghy and Ruairi Convery, Philip Muldoon and Shane McGuckin too. Them boys could have kept a small country going.

“They would be doing the snake up the bus. We would get off at the Greenvale and party.

“When we were stretching at the start of training Chris and Paddy would walk around and talk about all the craic that happened at the weekend.

“That never happened with any management that I was ever involved in. Definitely not at school.

“Our minor year was more relaxed than the year before. We were the older hands and we were a bit more easier going than the old hands from the year before. Myself , Jim Kelly and Philip Muldoon we ran about outside of football. The year before we wouldn’t have socialised compared to our final year.”

And this was finely orchestrated by the management. To the point that players like Philip Muldoon were told that they were there for the craic.

Sean McKenna said: “Philip Muldoon was always good craic. Sometimes he didn’t make the panel but he would be instructed to be on the bus with us. He was a bit of a ring leader. His big mate was Ciaran O’Neill (‘Snowball’). Charlie O’Kane was one of the assistant managers and he liked to keep the craic going. He was very close to the players.”

But Sean McKenna was also hand-picked for his ability to get the craic going.

Damien Canning said: “Chris Brown is a party man. He likes the banter and the slagging. When you see it in the management it makes it through the team. Sean McKenna was notorious for his partying. If you saw Sean at it then the rest of you can be at it.”

“Sean McKenna would say there is nothing special about him, he’s just a hard player.

“But Sean is a good lad at socialising. He was good at bringing ones together. At 18 the rest of us we didn’t have that, we maybe got it when we got older, but Sean had that and that was maybe the key to it.

“Sean would go down on the bus and he would sit in beside you and within five minutes you would know him. He is great.

“I would say that Chris Brown saw that in Sean, and that he was a bit more sociable than the rest of us. You saw Sean and you felt a bit more secure. He was a good captain. He was the first real captain that you ever experienced. You realise that captains are not a boy who roars at players or gives a silly team talk, it’s more than that. There is bringing people together. You felt that you were all in it together. Sean had that.”

And the atmosphere was always good.

Ciaran O’Neill said: “They let us do our own things. The only time Chris Brown was ever cross was at me. It was the week before the Ulster final, I played a friendly for the club. I should never have done it. It was stupid. It was only time Chris was ever cross with me. He effed me out for a minute, then he said, ‘forget about it’.

“That was the only cross word I ever heard all year. It was stupid, I never should have played that stupid match.”

So if there is a lesson to learn from the Derry 2000 teams is that perhaps making sure there is fun in your team is as important as training hard.

As Ciaran O’Neill said: “I think a lot of coaches out there are asking too much of players. Some club teams are training five or six nights a week and have drink bans. Some of the best club players like to enjoy themselves. You see players around

“Around Maghera, Glen and Slaughtneil men they like to enjoy themselves, but when the club season is on you never see them. But maybe that’s more to do with they don’t want to run into each other.”

By Ronan Scott

r.scott@gaeliclife.com