Contents

• Super Semi-Final Saturday
• Scotland trip draws closer
• AGM & Open Executive Meeting
• ABBAsolutely Brilliant!
• Correspondence Concludes…for now
• Other News
• Meet the Members: Paraic Naughton
• Team News
• Fixtures

Super Semi-Final Saturday

Two weeks on from the now infamous referee debacle, our Intermediate Hurlers look to book a place in the IHC Final, and change their title to Senior Hurlers.

The match vs Na Fianna takes place at 5pm in Mobhi Rd. We had a fantastic Scoil cohort the last day, and aim to emulate it on Saturday

Our Minor girls footballers have their own (div 2) championship semi final on Saturday. Luckily, their game is at 3pm in the 12th Lock so our diehards can get both games in! Please see Lucan to Na Fianna directions here

#UpScoil

Scotland trip draws closer

Following plenty of planning, work and fundraising, the stage is set for an experience of a lifetime for many of our juvenile members (and some lucky chaperones) as 150 Scoil members head to Scotland on October 28th!

The group will travel to Belfast where they will play a game against St Paul’s GAA, then take the ferry to Cairnryan and travel to Ayr in Scotland. After an overnight stay they will then travel to Glasgow to play Glasgow Gaels.

AGM & Open Executive Meeting

The 2017 AGM is approaching fast, with lots of positives to reflect on and, importantly, even more to look ahead to. All members & parents of members are encouraged to attend both the AGM and open executive meeting on Oct 21st.

ABBAsolutely Brilliant!

Well done & thanks to Joan Cushen, Marian Mottram & Gillian Linnane on organising what was a wonderful night for adult members young & old. The ladies also wish to thank all who supported the evening and made it such a success. This was another great evenign in what has been a fantastic year for the Stag Bar.

Correspondence Concludes…for now

Scoil Hurler of the 60s & 70s Liam Blood pens a final reply to Ramona’s letter ahead of this weekend’s refixed IHC semi-final which Liam will once again travel from Cavan to support.
We may even have a jersey for him…

The Jersey Part 2

At the conclusion of Part 1 I promised to reply to Ramon’s letter so here goes. I suppose reply is not really the correct term to use as there was no real questions asked rather it was just a conversation between 3 people who had just met. It helped that all 3 people had one thing in common; a love of hurling and 2 of us a love of the scoil. My daughter Fiona who was the third person had only heard of the scoil through 2nd hand information from myself. Fiona did most of the talking with Ramona most of it to do with my involvement with the scoil in the course of the conversation I managed to get some information on Ramona that her second name was Kennedy and that her husband had managed the minor hurlers and footballers at some stage and that 2 of her children now played. I actually met one of her sons on the day a fine well built young man who no doubt has a promising career in front of him. As the news of the cancellation broke so ended our conversation so i will do my best to fill in the remainder.

The scoil had not been my first club as having been born in East Wall the local club was O Tools so that is where my involvement with the GAA started. After having some success with them at juvenile level I was approached by none other than the scout AKA Tony Hempenstall who somehow or other convinced me my future lay with the scoil. Now how all that came about i really do not know but all of a sudden i was a scoil player. I won one trophy at underage level. I am not sure what age group it was maybe under 16 or minor. I progressed from minor to the intermediates and that started the most successful period of my hurling life. My first year as a intermediate hurler was just trying to break into the team. By the second year i think i was a starter and playing center field this was 1969 and we took of winning the league championship and Bolland Cup. I am not sure if there was another cup competition that year but something is nagging me that I am missing something. We played out the next few seasons as a senior side and then unfortunately i emigrated. On my return from the states in 79 I was by then a married man with a new born son we bought a house in Tallaght then a small suburb of Dublin with a very limited service sector and very few buses running from it so i struggled to make it to the games and as a result transferred to St Marks which was then just getting on its feet.I stayed with them till I retired. I won my second championship medal with them playing at full back in 1994 exactly 25 years after winning my first one. Now living in Cavan I have no involvement with any club, but Fiona and I are members of the friends of Dublin hurling and go to as many games as possible. As I haven’t heard anything from any of my old team mates this is as far as i can go. Best of luck to the lads on Saturday we will be there to shout you on                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                Liam

Other News

• Nursery Players of the Week; Donnacha, Evie, Fred and Aodh
• Members revel in Sam’s presence
• An appeal for spare books to OCS library
• Juvenile registrations now taking place; in the Club 10am-12noon Saturday
• G4MO All Ireland Blitz October 14th
• All coaches should verify with Aideen Lawlor that they are Garda-vetted

Meet Paraic Naughton

How long have you been involved in Scoil Uí Chonaill?
For as long as I can remember, I’ll say 18/19 years

Do you have any nicknames? How do you like to be addressed?
Podge, Nodge or P. I don’t mind how I’m addressed as long as people don’t ask where’s Rodge, that joke gets old quickly!

Where do you hail from?
I hail from Clontarf, Dublin.

How did you come to be involved in Scoil?
Both my parents played for the club, so there was no question that I wouldn’t get involved with the club.

Briefly describe your Scoil career as a player / mentor / contributor, if any.
I started off in the nursery with Cormac Hickey under the tutelage of Julie Egan, then played underage with Patsy O’Keeffe as my manager. Then I joined both adult panels with Matt & Dec as my managers. I have now started to help the U11 in hurling and manage the club bar.

What would you say you are most known for within Scoil? i.e. what do people associate you with?
I say most people would associate me with the club barman. I would like to change that to hurling/football player.

What has been your greatest Scoil moment / achievement?
Winning Minor football championship with the 91/92 guys.

What is your profession / field of study / passion?
I work in the Bank, studied in DIT product design, still have to find my passion…

What are your favourite hobbies outside of GAA?
Listening to music, and woodwork projects (when I get the chance)

If you could make one addition to Scoil in any way (don’t be restricted by the plausible!), what would it be?
Turn the training area into a 3g pitch and have it floodlit. And a rooftop bar for the club during the summer.

What is your favourite Scoil ‘quirk’?
The fact that the club originated from a school instead of a region/parish, very few clubs can say that (very similar to rugby clubs)

If you close your eyes and envisage Scoil in 10 years, what do you see?
Every underage panel having 20 to 25 players and have a team in every age group, and the adult mens & womens teams to be in the first divisions and second teams to be on div 5.

Finally, if you had to describe yourself as an animal, what would it be and why?
I would be a flamingo because I’ve only one good leg to stand on!!

Team News

In Summary:

• Final AFL2 game vs Templeogue Synge Street set for Oct 14th
• AFL7 playof semi-final fixed for Oct 15th
• Red card and crossbars the story of a tough day for Minor Boys
• u10 Footballers fight back to take a draw & win vs well drilled St Peters
• Slow start only temporary as u9 girls found their rhythm vs Ballymun
• u8 Footballers keep best for last vs St Sylvesters
• Nursery continues, and welcomes newcomers as always

MFC Scoil Minors (Isles of the Sea)

1-07 vs Templeogue Synge Street 1-13 on 01.10.17 in Dolphin Park

How it all played out

Final football game in the group stages of the B Championship for Scoil minors. First half was a close battle until we were reduced to 14 men after 20 minutes. A couple of goal chances were not converted thanks to the upright and the cross-bar. Half time score of 0-6 to 0-3 to Templeogue left if all to play for in the second half. A bright start to the second half with a well-worked team goal followed by a point, brought us level. Although every single player on the pitch gave it their all right up to the final whistle, it wasn’t to be. The match finished with a scoreline of 1-13 to 1-07 to

Templeogue. Once again, many thanks to the great support on the sideline.

Who were the star performers / scorers

David Kennedy 0-3; Evan Caulfield 1-0; Robert Kennedy 0-2; David Pugh, Conor Ennis 0-1 each.

What’s up next

Final hurling match in the B championship vs Brigids on Sunday 8th October in Scoil at 11am.

#UpScoil

U10 Football

How it all played out;

Team Liam Ryan:

Team travelled to Ballyboughal this morning to take on St Peters.

With some of our regulars missing, Scoil kids struggled in the first half to keep up with some brilliant football on display from St Peters – we’ve no doubt that some of those players will be playing in the Dubs jerseys, in years to come.

The game was played in great spirit and both teams had a huge amount of respect for each other. St Peters were on top for the first half but the team responded to an inspirational speech from Conal.

Great tactical switch from Ronan Murphy by pushing Conor up front – Adam & Alan fought hard in midfield to feed the ball into Conor, who was scoring for fun today.

Alex, Ronan & Diarmuid worked tirelessly to protect their goalkeeper Tadhg today also.

In the end a well earned / hard fought draw against a really good team.

Team Jp Courtney:

First half performance was appalling by the lads and they were well and truly humbled on the scoresheet by half time. A few choice words and soul searching during half time talk, produced a recovery, one could only have dreamt of.

From the restart the lads dragged themselves back into the game, chipping away at opposition lead. I must say I nearly had an anurism as they insisted on going for goals only, rather than taking their points. With about 5 mins to play we pulled level and through a number of great kick outs from Liam, Jack & Conal pulled off some brilliant individual points/scores.

In the end a remarkable turnaround with a 5-8 to 7-14 win for Scoil Team.

Who were the star performers;

Team Liam Ryan:

Conor was superb and had his best game in Scoil Jersey today but

for pure attitude Conal was key & kept the lads chins up when game could have run away from them.

Team JP Courtney:

Despite getting a consistent bollocking from me, Jack was super with his points / frees today,  followed closely by Conal Kenny (If I can get them running/passing I’ll be onto a winner). Absolutely delighted for Aurelian (smallest player on field) – who pulled off a magical fist point to take the lead.

However for sheer determination & desire to get the ball, I’m going to give joint MOM to Alex Culligan & Calvin – who between them pulled off some great blocks, to keep us in the game.

To echo earlier sentiments – Two brilliant games played in good, tough spirits with some fantastic scores to boot. On a personal level, very proud of all my lads for today’s fight back – would have told them but they legged it to see “SAM” & Dean Rock.

“Tough as Teak” alive and well.

Draw & Win against a very well drilled outfit/club – Good times!!

#UpScoil

u9 Ladies Football

How it all played out

We played away to Ballymun Kickams on Sunday morning. The girls had a slow start and despite having the best of the chances we found ourselves narrowly behind. However a few words of encouragement as well as a few positional changes at half time changed the game completely. Scoil took complete control in the second half and moved the ball at pace into scoring positions and our forwards did the rest.

Who were the star performers / scorers

Again every player contributed greatly to the performance and a noticeable improvement in positional play which was the main theme of the half time rant/discussion. However a special mention for Caragh who had possession stats that were off the chart throughout as well as putting the shackles on their best player. Also Cliodhna who was absolutely lethal in the second half.

What’s up next

Another away football match at Westmanstown Gaels on Sunday morning

#UpScoil

u8 Scoil Uí Chonaill

vs St Sylvesters @home 30/09/2017

Scoil keep best for last Vs Sylvesters

How it all played out

Our under 8s turned out in large numbers on Saturday and were joined by two new players in Cody and Denis. We had a good chat about the fact that we need to get the football in order to be able to play and all the players agreed to compete hard for the ball. The teams must have been still mulling over what this meant in the first round of matches as Sylvester’s started very dominantly with Scoil finding it hard to lay a hand on them. Each Sylvester’s team seemed to have 2-3 strong players that could carry the ball, side step and burst through tackles and they racked up a lot of early scores in this way. It looked like it would be a long morning for Scoil.

But very gradually, after the first round of games, the tide began to turn. The second round of games were much tighter affairs and Scoil began to put together some nice team scores. In a remarkable turn of fortunes, Scoil finished on top in the last round of games. As Sylvester’s strong individual players began to fade, Scoil began to find a rhythm and some neat passing, combined with better pressure from the defenders, saw us finish strongly.

The coaches and supporters present were incredibly proud of the way that the teams stuck at their task to finish strongly  and never let heads drop. While results on the day were mixed, it was a real victory for the character of the Scoil kids and if we can keep that spirit alive over the coming months we’ll see great progress without doubt.

Who were the star performers / scorers

For the Ambers, Jake was everywhere, executing block-downs at one end and popping up with scores at the other. Meanwhile Shay continued his recent improvement and was also very influential for his team. Oisin worked hard throughout. Our two new boys, Denis and Cody also made good contributions.

For the Maroon’s, Darragh was tenacious and epitomised the team spirit right to the end. Cody won some good loose ball, while Sylvester’s defenders will be having nightmares about Cónán who continually chased and harried.

Finally for the Blues, Aoibhinn competed hard throughout and her work was rewarded by a great point at the end. Jamie was a revelation in the backs as he began to figure out how to use his strength to drive Sylvester’s players wide, while Aoife too made a big contribution in defence, in particular discovering a canny knack to hoover up and clear loose ball.

What’s up next

Fingallians away in hurling @10 a.m. on Saturday

#UpScoil

Fixtures