Laois GAA to honour 1973 All-Ireland Junior Football team

The Laois GAA County Board are set to honour the All-Ireland Junior Football champions of fifty years ago, by coincidence the date is September 30, the same date as the All-Ireland fifty years ago.

The venue is the County Board headquarters beside Laois Hire O'Moore Park. The following day, the occasion of the Laois Senior football Semi-finals, the players will be introduced to those in attendance.

Sadly a number of the panel have gone to their eternal reward but they will be represented by family members, every effort has been made to contact those away from home and it is hoped the panel will all be able to attend.

To those who played in the All-Ireland of 1973 it probably feels like a life time but to those who were not around, then it seems a long long time, yes we are speaking of the All-Ireland junior football final between Laois and London, the game was played at New Eltham and a large Laois following made the journey.

The competition started in O’Moore Park on May 20th and Kilkenny were the visitors and back then Kilkenny treated football very seriously but Laois ran out comfortable winners and advanced to the Leinster final against Meath and the game was played at Newbridge, Laois would have been under dogs but produced a fine second half to claim a rare victory over the Royal County, score line read 1-9 to 0-9, that meant a trip to Pearse Park in Longford for the All-Ireland Home final on September 9th by now the Laois following was getting bigger and their opponents were the Connacht champions from Yeats Country Sligo, like Laois they were starved of success. 

Laois produced a great second half and ran out victorious by 2-13 to 1-5, next stop was New Eltham in London and Laois brought a large following by Aer Lingus and were greeted by hundreds of emigrants from the O’Moore County, in a closely contested affair the O’Moores prevailed by a narrow margin of 0-12 to1-8. The first Laois captain to receive an All-Ireland football trophy was Eamon “Atch” Whelan of Portlaoise.  

This was the first All-Ireland title for the O’Moore County, since the hurlers defeated Cork in hurling 6-2 to 4-1 in Croke Park, Laois were known as Ballygeehan and Cork were called the Redmond’s.

The success of fifty years ago was the only football success until, Laois minors captained by Martin Delaney also of Portlaoise, beat Kerry in 1996 (2-11 to 1-11 referee Brian White Wexford), the minor team included one Danny Doogue and fifty years ago the junior champions also included Danny Doogue from Graiguecullen.