FORMER Cavan forward Seanie Johnston has joined Kilcoo’s coaching team.
Magpies boss Martin Corey knows Johnston from their time together in the Breffni county, and he joins the reigning Down kingpins after Tyrone All-Ireland winner Joe McMahon returned to home club, Omagh.
McMahon has joined up with brother Justin, who was confirmed as the new St Enda’s manager at the end of November.
Corey and McMahon had started 2025 working under Robbie Brennan in Meath, before making a shock exit just eight days before the Royals faced Carlow in the Leinster championship. Weeks later, their new posting in Kilcoo was confirmed.
Monaghan man Corey, a six-time county champion with Clontibret during his playing pomp, has had a distinguished coaching career since hanging up his boots.
Having helped Castlerahan end their wait for a first-ever Cavan SFC crown in 2019 – following three straight final defeats – Corey was brought into the Breffni county set-up by Mickey Graham.
In the delayed 2020 championship, played against the backdrop of the Covid pandemic, Cavan upset the odds when they lifted the Anglo-Celt Cup for the first time in 23 years – beating Donegal in a dramatic decider played inside a virtually empty Athletic Grounds.
Johnston’s inter-county playing career had come to an end the previous year, but he joined Cavan Gaels club-mate Graham’s coaching team in 2022, where he worked alongside Corey for a year.
Johnston then took up the reins at Ballybay in 2023. He succeeded Jerome Johnston, after the Kilcoo man and fellow Down man Mark Doran guided the club to the Monaghan SFC title.
Johnston most recently managed Cuchullains in his native county.
Kilcoo have won 13 of the last 14 county titles, making it seven in-a-row last October. However, their ambition to get back to the top of the pile in Ulster was thwarted by Scotstown in a dramatic provincial decider.
Elsewhere in Down, Carryduff – beaten by Kilcoo in last year’s county final – have new management.
Danny McConnell wears the bainisteoir’s bib, having been involved with the management team that won a hat-trick of county U21 titles from 2017-2019, providing the foundation stones for the current Carryduff senior side.
Derry All-Ireland winner Enda Gormley heads up the coaching team. The Watty Graham’s, Glen clubman has experience of the Down club scene, having played with Carryduff’s south Belfast rivals Bredagh for years, while he was also involved with Darragh Cross alongside DJ Kane until 2022.
Ex-Derry number one Thomas Mallon comes in as goalkeeping coach. The Loup man was part of Conor Laverty’s Down backroom team last year but, when Ciaran Meenagh left the Mourne county to take up the Oak Leaf manager’s job, Mallon went with him.
Meenagh and Mallon were also involved in Loughmacrory’s breakthrough Tyrone SFC triumph last November.
Former Tyrone strength and conditioning coach Robbie Bremner is onboard, so too former minor manager Alan Ward, while James Guinness will also be involved in a coaching capacity.
The club would love to have star forward at their disposal on the field, but he is set for an extended spell on the sidelines after suffering a cruciate ligament injury at county training last month – days before Down’s second league outing against Limerick.
It was a bitter blow for the 29-year-old, who suffered a similar injury in 2022.
Former Armagh player Finnian Moriarty was with Carryduff for the previous four years. He has since taken up the manager’s post at 2024 All-Ireland champions Glen, replacing Rory Kavanagh.
