Corey, Paddy
October 29, 1993
Paddy Corey -Tyrone star of the fifties
His contribution to red hand football will never be forgotten.
When it comes to talking about the Senior team's performances on the football pitch, the people of Tyrone have been somewhat disappointed with their lot in recent years. Their underage teams have been going well but the transition from underage success to Senior success is proving to be a slow and somewhat uncertain process. Over the past few years G.A.A. fans inside the O'Neill County have been offered very little to shout about by the
Senior footballers. Instead they like to look to the future, or remember their great players and teams of the past. They will talk in Tyrone about how close they came to winning the National League in '92, about how with a bit more belief in themselves they could've beaten Kerry in the 1986 All-Ireland Championship final, about their first ever Ulster Championship success in '56 and their most recent one in '89. They will also talk about the 'Supermacs', the men who offered so much to Tyrone football and who seem almost irreplaceable - McGarvey McGinn, McCabe, McKenna and McClure. Another name you will hear mentioned frequently in G.A.A. circles in the Ulster county is that of Paddy Corey, who performed heroic deeds in the white and red county jersey of Tyrone at centre half back in the 50s and 60s - and whose contribution to Tyrone football will never be forgotten.
Paddy Corey is a native of Dromore, about eight miles outside Omagh town, but he presently resides at Tamlaght Road in Omagh. He first started to play football at Juvenile level for the Dromore club (Juvenile football being Under 16 in those days) he then played for the Minor and Senior teams before transferring to St. Enda's club in Omagh in the early 50s. The principal character responsible for introducing him to the game was local priest Father Duffy, who had a tremendous interest in the game and guided him onto the Juvenile team. Success came early for Corey when he won a Juvenile Championship medal with Dromore and at the age of sweet sixteen he broke into the club's Senior team where he stayed for four years before transferring to the Senior team in Omagh. The Dromore man spent two full decades playing club football in Tyrone, pulling on the boots right up until 1968.
A wing back or a full back for St. Enda's Paddy was more renowned as a centre back once he had broken into the county team. Playing with Omagh club he picked up three Senior County Championship medals - twice captaining the team to success. In Ulster in those days there was a number of tournaments held annually which, although many readers may not have heard of them were immensely popular at the time. such competitions involved a wrist watch tournament in Irvinestown, Co. Fermanagh (with watches for prizes!), a 'transistor' tournament in Ederney, Co. Fermanagh (with transistor radios as prizes) and a 'suit length' tournament which was held at he St. Enda's pitch in Omagh with (you've guessed it!!!) a length of material as a prize. Paddy Corey won many such tournaments with St. Enda's and, one could argue, prizes which were ultimately much more useful than medals.
Long after Paddy was pulling on the jersey for the club he was doing great work on their behalf. He recently developed an illness which required that he had to start taking it easy. Before that, however, he was responsible for an awful lot of development work on the club's premises. He laid the present playing field and was the man behind the building of the club rooms and other facilities at the county ground in Tyrone. Corey's pastimes would mostly concern listening to the radio or watching the television (sports programmes mainly) and he is to this day a very keen G.A.A. follower. He tells us that whenever he can he likes to get out to watch any match on a Sunday - whether it be club or county, Junior, Intermediate or Senior fare. As a supporter over the years he has followed the Tyrone county team from one end of the country to the other. and he travelled a bit with the team as a player too!!
It was in a National League game in 1954 against Fermanagh in Omagh that Paddy Corey lined out for the Tyrone Seniors for the first time. Since that day he was to mark some of the great names of Gaelic football. He marked Mayo's great Tom Langan when the Irish Army team played Tyrone in Omagh, Pat Campbell of Armagh, Down pair Sean O'Neill and James McCartan, Derry's Owen Gribben, Art O'Hagan of Armagh, Patsy Linden of Antrim, Fermanagh's P.T., Treacy, former Galway captain Sean Purcell - all will remember their battles with Paddy Corey and testify to his tremendous strength and agile high-fielding abilities.
Prior to 1956 Tyrone had not as yet managed to win an Ulster Senior football crown. But they came up against Cavan (one of four teams who had shared the title between them for the previous 68 years) in that year's decider and defeated them convincingly on a scoreline of 3-5 to 0-4. Defeating that Cavan team which included Gunner Brady, Peter Donoghue and the Carolans represents something of a watershed for Tyrone football. They were beaten 0-8 to 0-6 by Galway in the All-Ireland semi final and successfully defended their Ulster title, beating Derry 1-9 to 1-10 in the final the following year. Tyrone football had been born and no small part was played in that in that birth by their great centre half back Paddy Corey.
There were four other St. Enda's players on that Tyrone team - Jackie Taggart, Thaddy Turbit and brothers Donal and Sean Donnelly. Paddy Corey is retired now - but it's not all that long since he was running a very successful building contractors operation which he built up himself after starting out as a brick-layer. Early in his football career he had a run out with the Tyrone Minors - but he only played for them once as they were beaten by Armagh in the first round. Senior Ulster Championship success was just around the corner though. Paddy remembers fondly the 'excellent trainer' that was Gerry Brown from St. Coleman's Newry who brought Tyrone to previously unthreaded ground in 1956.
Not surprisingly the Dromore man cites 1956 as the greatest year of his career. "It was a great thrill to get playing in Croke Park in those days. Back then when an Ulster team was going to Dublin to play in Croke Park they were just interested in putting on a good show. But the confidence is there now and it's not like that anymore", says the man who made two memorable appearances on Headquarters turf. The year after Galway beat Tyrone in the same venue for the penultimate stage of the 1956/'57 National League. Galway winning yet again and thus denying us two Ulster titles, Paddy also collected numerous McKenna Cup and Langan Cup medals with the Red Hand County.
Playing at the back for a Gaelic football team in the 50s you had to catch just about every ball that came near you or people would tell you straight that you were useless. A good high jump, a nice pair of hands and then a long boot upfield were the order of the day - Paddy Corey from Omagh did it as well as any. In those days the defenders duties were clearly defined: "Get your hands on the ball and belt it upfield". No fancy frills, no building from the back. "High fielding was all important", he points out. "In them years the back just marked the forward and that was the name of the game. You took the ball under one arm and used the other arm to work your way out. If you broke the ball you wouldn't be picked the following Sunday".
Paddy played alongside some true stars on the Tyrone team. Thady Turbitt ("the best in Ireland in those days") Jackie Taggart ("as tough a half back as you'll get") and up front the likes of Frankie Donnelly and Frank Higgins. The former Tyrone centre half tells us that it was great to be involved with G.A.A. over the years. "In those years what else was there for a young fella? It's the greatest game out. All over the county you'll always meet somebody who'll want to talk to you about it. There's nothing to beat it. We had a very good County Board at the time and were well looked after. We got to America in '57 and stayed at the Henry Hudson hotel in New York. We were treated like royalty. It's something you could never forget - very few people ever got to across the Atlantic in those days. The county team was very well looked after and we gave it our all on the field. It was hard going, the ball in them days was laced and when it got wet the weight of it was nothing ordinary. As regards entertainment, it was great to see backs catching the ball", he enthuses.
The face of the game has changed rather drastically since Paddy Corey was player. "The game was harder then, fitness wasn't as much an aspect. There was a West Tyrone board and an East Tyrone board and sometimes we'd go out to play, for the county team and be asking. "Who's your man?. You mightn't know half the boy's on the team until after the game!. Corey isn't at all surprised by the sweeping success which has been enjoyed by Ulster teams in recent years. "We (Tyrone) should've won one before Down and even after Down's success if you'd asked anybody who'll be the next Ulster team to win an All-Ireland they'd have said Tyrone", he points out. But things haven't quite fallen into place for the O'Neill County men as yet. Their former star feels that success might not be too far off though. "Some of the players don't seem to realise how important it is. When you pull on the county jersey, you must go all out to win at any cost. You have to get in your tackle if it means you won't play again for the rest of the year. That's where Donegal and Derry have scored. Our hunger wasn't enough against Armagh this year. You have to give it your all. You have to be fully committed or you'll get nowhere. Nobody would love to see Tyrone winning a title more than me -but at the moment they're making too many mistakes. They gave away three goals against Offaly in the first League game so there's something wrong. Having said that, we have a few good young players who will probably come good at some stage in the future and two class players like Canavan and Cush could play in any team", explains Tyrone's great star from the past. Paddy Corey. They say that Ulster football is a minefield. Well, the big fish had better watch out for Tyrone next year, because the O'Neill county is one mine that is primed and ready to explode.
Written by the Hogan Stand Magazine
29th Oct 1993
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