Noel Tierney – a pillar of Galway greatness

HE broke our hearts. But when he died last week our respect for the natural talent Noel Tierney wielded had never waned.

He was full-back on the team that steered Galway to three All-Irelands in a row starting in 1964 when the game was less complicated and far more attractive than is now practised by Tierney’s contemporaries around the country.

It was a time when we in Mayo were trying to replicate our golden start to the fifties. Thirteen years had passed since Mayo won the second of their two-in-a-row and even though all of the greats of those years had departed the scene, our compelling expectations hung on new potential that promised new success in no time at all.

We had Morley and Prendergast, Carey and Connaughton, and Corcoran, Langan and Farragher, all burgeoning talent whom we expected to re-conquer the fields of Ireland and realise our own invincible dreams.

It was also a Galway after Purcell and Stockwell. They, too, had left their mark on the fifties, and the senior prospects for the new decade were illuminated by All-Ireland minor success in 1963. The following year with many of those minors on board the Tribesmen, almost unheralded, were catapulted into senior success.

At full-back, Noel Tierney was the buttress of their performances. He had, of course, Enda Colleran and Bosco McDermott on either side. But he was their pillar in the centre with huge hands, a stocky build and a cat-like leap. 

And yet, curiously, the Milltown man was not always afforded the credit reserved for some members of that great side. Rave reviews seem most times to pass him by. Admired yes, but not in the way Enda Colleran, their captain for the final two years, seemed to be revered. Or Mattie McDonagh or Seamus Leydon or Cyril Dunne or John Keenan. Not in the way Paddy Prendergast was evaluated or distinguished in Mayo. Excellent, yes, but only as part of the overall excellence of the team. Not a stand-out.

Tierney and Prendergast were quality fullbacks. Neither was tall, but were high fielders and strong and determined in their clearances. There’s a picture of Prendergast jumping for a ball in 1951 with the number 3 visible over the crossbar. There’s one of Tierney in 1964 lording it over two Cork forwards.

The two had one thing in common. Each was the best fullback produced in their respective counties. Not in any of their successive victories did any Galway fullback emulate the form displayed by Tierney in those three prosperous years. No one in Mayo in the past 73 years has come close to reaching the virtuoso performances of the Ballintubber man in his illustrious days.

Tierney’s career may have been shorter than that of the Mayo man, but no less impressive. He was chosen as Footballer of the Year for 1964. He won three All-Irelands, a minor All-Ireland, five Connacht medals, two Railway Cups as well as county junior and senior championships with his native Milltown.

Galway’s All-Ireland in 64 spawned strong hope that Mayo would soon emulate the new champions. And that hope grew stronger after another Galway title the following year. A third successive championship seemed out of the question and since Mayo had presented the greatest challenge to the Tribesmen on their journey to ultimate success, 1966 stood out as their most realistic opportunity of regaining old glory.

They met in the Connacht final in MacHale Park that year and for the entire GAA community the fixture was the topic. A county dripping with All-Ireland success being challenged by a new warrior spirit from Mayo. They came from all over the country for the encounter. Over thirty thousand people were wedged into a standless MacHale Park.

The game see-sawed with breathless excitement and the sides were on level terms into injury time when Liam Salmon swung over the winning point for the champions who went on to fashion their third title on the trot, a record that still stands in the province.

Tierney was at the heart of those conquests, but it was the captaincy of Colleran, the accuracy of John Keenan, the strength of Mattie McDonagh at centre-half forward and the speed of Leydon and Dunne and Martin Newell that attracted most of the acclaim.

A year later after Mayo finally defeated the champions in Pearse Stadium Noel Tierney called it a day and devoted the rest of his life to farming. It was there that gas from a slurry tank claimed the life of his son Fergal and almost also of his father. The accident was to haunt Noel for the rest of his life.

Only a couple of weeks ago, before his death, Milltown honoured their native son on the golden jubilee of his first All-Ireland senior success. They came from all over Galway and many other parts of the country to join in the celebrations and there was a certain poignancy in the photograph taken of Noel and the county’s current star Paul Conroy sporting the footballer-of-the-year trophies each had won fifty years apart.