Throwback Thursday: North Mon v Críost Rí's Harty Cup final clash divided Leeside

IT was 42 years ago yesterday, that the city was split by the River Lee as the North Mon faced Coláiste Chríost Rí in the Harty Cup final.

This game brought some of the best players from Na Piarsaigh and Glen Rovers up against the best of the best from the Barrs, Nemo Rangers, and Blackrock. But this wasn’t just about hurling, that was just a by-product, city bragging rights were up for grabs alongside one of the most coveted trophies that the sport has to offer.

The Norries wanted to get one over on those from the south side. Everyone from Turner’s Cross was desperate to bring a second Harty Cup to Capwell Road. There was no shortage of subplots as the two teams made their way out at Páirc Uí Chaoimh on the afternoon of March 29, 1981.

The Mon were aiming to become the first school since St Finbarr’s in 1973 and 1974 to win back-to-back Harty Cups. They were also reigning All-Ireland champions after their victory over Birr Community School in the previous year’s Dr Croke Cup final. They were an experienced unit, and hoping to dethrone them was Críost Rí team desperate for a senior Munster hurling trophy.

DUAL

This came on the back of the school’s footballers completing a hat-trick of Corn Uí Mhuirí successes in 1980. Football had been established as the dominant sport in Críost Rí, and all the hurlers had going for them was just one Harty Cup success from 1968 and a collection of runners-up medals from that year’s Dr Croke Cup final.

One bridge between those two generations was teacher Jim Cremin, was on the 1968 team and he trained the school’s hurlers in 1981.

There was so much going on in the build-up to the final that it dominated discussions around the city for weeks.

One player caught in the middle was 15-year-old Dermot Crowley, whose allegiances to the Glen and Críost Rí brought him up against a North Mon team filled with club-mates. Cormac Harrington was in a similar position, as he lined out for Blackrock alongside Críost Rí’s Diarmuid Cotter.

In addition to the city rivalries, there were inter-club rivalries, and everything was to be decided one afternoon at the home of Cork hurling.

Over 8,000 people lined the terraces at Páirc Uí Chaoimh and that was a strange sight to players who were just teenagers.

“But the final was the talk of the city. It was northside-southside, there were press photographers at training, interviews… I turned 17 before the game. It was a big deal to a kid at that age,” Críost Rí goalkeeper Diarmuid Cotter told the Irish Examiner.

“The attendance on the day was given as 8,000, but my memory is that the old covered stand was full, there could have been more than that. Being honest, it was the biggest game that a lot of us played in."

The Mon prepared meticulously throughout the competition, they even watched a video of St Colman’s before the semi-final. It was as professional as you could get in a tournament designed for players under the age of eighteen.

All of this paid off when captain John Drinan knocked in two goals and that gave the Mon an early lead. This came from the acute analysis of manager Murt Murphy, who made sure that ‘a lot of work was done with John on flicking high balls with one hand’ before throw-in.

TENSE

This heightened the tension inside the Páirc and things exploded with the dismissals of Tony Leahy from Críost Rí and Robert Allen from the Mon. With both teams down to 14 men, it was wide open for someone to fully assert themselves and take the title.

The Mon pulled everyone back, trying to defend a two-point lead, and the ball went to Fergie Golden. He tried to score from ‘an impossible angle’ but missed, and that wrapped things up.

The game finished 2-6 to 1-17 and the Harty Cup, along with the city’s bragging rights, were going over the North Gate Bridge and up Shandon Street towards North Monastery Road.

North Mon went on and lost the Dr Croke Cup final to Kilkenny CBS, but there was more joy in 1990 as two of the panel’s players helped Na Piarsaigh win the Cork Senior Hurling Championship for the first time ever. Not only had they claimed the city’s top dog status as teenagers, they also managed to get the Sean Óg Murphy Cup up to Farranree.

It was one of the greatest days that Cork hurling has ever seen with sporting tradition colliding with the very fabric of the city. Over 40 years on and it is still talked about as one of the defining games of a golden era for inter-college hurling in Cork.