IF THERE is any man who has the measure of Colm ‘Collie’ McGurk, it is surely Séamus Downey.
Confronted with the tragic news of McGurk’s sudden passing at the age of 55 yesterday evening, Downey called upon a memory bank worth a lifetime. The two grew up together in the south Derry parish of Lavey and graduated through the ranks of the local Erin’s Own club year after year, forming an unbreakable bond that would eventually lead to national glory.
While both McGurk and Downey were on the panel that famously won Derry their only All-Ireland Senior Football Championship in 1993, that was just the tip of a substantial iceberg. McGurk’s services to Gaelic games spanned everything from All-Ireland senior club triumph with Lavey, to putting his architect’s expertise to masterful use in the overhaul of Owenbeg; an Ulster Senior Hurling Championship winner’s medal to managing the Oak Leaf’s senior hurlers in more recent years.
“He was just effervescent, that’s the word that comes to mind when I think of Colm,” said Downey.
“I played with Colm right through, at every grade, at football and hurling with Lavey and at football with Derry, and I have a lifetime’s worth of memories as a result.
“He had a bucket load of medals to show for his efforts. He had 19 senior championship medals between football and hurling, for Lavey and Derry, he won Sigerson with Queen’s, and he played on a combined colleges hurling team – which shows you the talent he brought to either code at every level.”
Downey was also at Belfast’s Queen’s University at the same time as McGurk in the late 1980s and early ’90s, when the two shared a house together, before McGurk went on to become a highly respected architect, working on community and sporting projects throughout Ireland.
“He was a larger than life character. He was infectious in the changing room and he was equally infectious off the pitch,” said Downey of his former team-mate.
“What will stick with me is the craic we had with each other down all the years we played together. We shared a house together as well when we were both at university and, there we were, a load of lads from Lavey, in this house in Belfast together, those are memories I will cherish.
“He was a devout family man who himself came from a very close knit family. The McGurks are the backbone of the Lavey club, going back to his father and before. I worked very closely with Colm on a major club redevelopment plan not too long ago and that will now stand as a concrete tribute of his to the people of Lavey and to Gaelic games locally.
“He was so full of life. No matter where he went, the enthusiasm he brought with him rubbed off on the people around him. Whether he was managing or whatever else, there were very few places he went that he wasn’t successful and, if he wasn’t, people still had the pleasure of saying they got to work with Collie McGurk.”
