TRILLICK have proved you write them off at your peril – and stalwart Richie Donnelly insists there is a steady supply line coming behind those who spearheaded Sunday’s Tyrone championship triumph.
The likes of Richie, older brother Mattie and the Brennans, Rory and Lee, and veteran Niall Donnelly have backboned the Trillick team for the past decade, during which the O’Neill Cup has returned to St Macartan Park three times.
However, 20-year-old Seanie O’Donnell was among the Red’s top performers at O’Neills Healy Park, while Daley Tunney (22), Daniel Donnelly (21), Peter McCaughey (23), Liam Gray (23) and Ciaran Daly (20) also played a huge part as defending champions Errigal Ciaran were dethroned.
“There was a man from Errigal Ciaran told me last November that this Trillick team was finished, which I was sort of surprised at,” said Donnelly.
“We have a lot of young boys who stood up in the championship this year and we have more coming, so it’s very exciting. We have four or five young boys coming in next year who have good quality too.”
The secret of the club’s success, though, comes from the men and women who have laid firm foundation stones down through the decades.
“There’s a lot of variables.
“We have a very strong purpose. It’s the John and Patsy Kellys, uncle ‘Shep’ [Gerard Donnelly], the auld boy Liam, Pat King, Brendan Donnelly, Sean Donnelly… it’s those boys have passed that on to us.
“They meet us on the street they’re not a burden to their success, those men want to lift us up. They want us to taste it. You just have to look them in the eye. I met John Kelly this morning at the grave and the two of us just cried… you don’t have to speak.
“They pass that on to us. That’s our foundation. And then we have the quality, the work-rate and the desire to go and do it.”
And when the big day came, Trillick stood up and silenced the doubters tipping Errigal to become the first Tyrone club to hold onto the county crown since Crarickmore in 2005.
“To an extent it hurt us because I think our quality was disregarded slightly.
“I just don’t think from the outside people respected the quality we have. Our team is littered with characters and quality players that have delivered on the inter-county stage.
“So for that to be dismissed was hurtful in a way, but we just trusted what we have in the group.”
