The Cavan over 40s team put the tragic death of team-mate Paddy Gaffney behind them to win the All-Ireland Masters Shield in 2006. Here, wing forward and Arva clubman Conal Conneely shares his recollections on the success. In a year when the Cavan footballers failed to make an impact at senior level, the county's over 40s team gave supporters something to cheer about when they captured the All-Ireland Masters Shield following a two-point victory over neighbours Leitrim in Mullingar. The Cavan players were quick to dedicate the success to their former team-mate Paddy Gaffney from Denn who died unexpectedly during a junior club match last summer. Paddy had just returned from Australia where he had played for Ireland against the home nation in the Masters International Rules series. When the Irish and Australian over 40 teams renewed their rivalry under the new floodlights at Kingspan Breffni Park at the end of October, Ireland became the inaugural winners of the Paddy Gaffney Cup which was presented in Paddy's memory. Fittingly, the Cup was presented to another Denn man Martin Cahill, who captained the Irish team, while the other Cavan men who contributed to the victory were new senior football manager Donal Keogan (also Denn), Michael Brady, Kevin Madden, Gabriel Patterson, Aidan Watters, Jimmy Galligan and Tomas Smyth. "Paddy was on the Cavan Masters team for 10 years and following his untimely death, we decided that we would make a big effort to win the All-Ireland," explains Arva's Conal Conneely, who was wing forward on the Cavan team. "That didn't happen, unfortunately, but we regrouped for the Shield competition and managed to win that. It was nice to salvage something from the year, but if we had a full squad we might have won the big prize. We were never able to be put our best team out, but it's easy to forget that lads do have other commitments outside of football." 2006 was Conal's first year on the Masters team, having accepted an invitation from club colleague Philip Brady to become involved. His team-mates included ex-senior stars Kevin Madden, Bernard Morris, Jimmy Galligan, Aidan Watters and recently-appointed Cavan senior manager Donal Keogan. Although Conal has officially retired from club football, he enjoyed the experience so much that he intends lining out for the over 40s again this year. "I found it to be very enjoyable and I'll definitely give it a go again this year," he says. Jointly-managed by P Cahill (Crosserlough) and Terry Hyland (Lacken), Cavan played four games in the All-Ireland championship and two in the Shield competition. There was no organised training. Instead, challenge matches were arranged against junior club teams and against the Leitrim Masters. In the All-Ireland championship, the Breffni County beat Tipperary in Cappamore, drew with Roscommon in Mullahoran and lost to both Dublin and Mayo in Malahide and Kingspan Breffni Park respectively. As it transpired, Dublin and Mayo went on to contest the All-Ireland final which resulted in a 2-12 to 0-10 victory for the Westerners. "Mayo only beat us by a point and Dublin beat us by five so weren't that far off winning the main competition. Dublin had a very strong team which included the likes of Jack Sheedy, Joe McNally, Mick Deegan, John O'Leary, Ciaran Duff and Kevin O'Brien from Wicklow, and I was surprised that they didn't win it out. "The result that really cost us was the draw with Roscommon. If we had won that, we would have gone through to the quarter-final and who knows what might have happened after that." All was not lost for Cavan, however, who then defeated Sligo to qualify for the Shield final against Leitrim. The game was played at St. Loman's, Mullingar on the eve of the All-Ireland senior final as a curtain-raiser to the Mayo v Dublin clash, and a strong second half showing was the key to the Breffni County's 1-8 to 0-9 victory. The final was a keenly contested affair with the sides level on no less than seven different occasions. Cavan were favoured by a strong breeze in the first half, but fell behind to a fourth minute point from Leitrim's Frank Niblock. Tomas Smyth levelled within a minute and the stalemate continued over the next six minutes with Leitrim's Shane Heslin and Cavan's Adge King trading points. But Leitrim were two points clear at the end of the first quarter thanks to scores from Hubie Reynolds and Fergus O'Donnell. Cavan responded, however, with three unanswered points from impressive substitute Seamus Donohue to lead for the first time. But a Niblock brace had Leitrim 0-6 to 0-5 in front at the break. With wind advantage to come, Leitrim seemed poised for victory but Cavan rolled up their sleeves and resumed with points from Donohue and Keogan. Former All-Star Mickey Quinn then shot two marvellous scores to restore the Connacht side's slender advantage, but after Donohue restored parity, the same player scored the only goal in the 41st minute to put Cavan in the driving seat at a crucial stage. Leitrim were awarded a penalty three minutes later, but Quinn's spot kick hit the crossbar and was cleared. Shane Heslin pointed for Leitrim with 10 minutes remaining, but they were unable to reduce the deficit further as Cavan held on for a deserved victory. "It didn't look good for us at half-time when we trailed after playing with the wind," Conal remembers. "Leitrim had about 10 subs, whereas we had only two. But we upped our performance in the second half and the goal gave us some valuable breathing space. And after Leitrim missed the penalty, we did just enough to hold onto our lead." Conal has represented Cavan at all levels, although he made just one appearance for the county seniors in a McKenna Cup game against Monaghan. He was a key member of the Arva team that won an intermediate league and championship double in 1983. Those were successful times for Arva and in 1988 they contested a senior league semi-final against Mullahoran, having finished second in the league table. But emigration soon took its toll and within a few years, Arva were back plying their trade in the junior ranks. One of the highlights of Conal's playing career was winning a junior league medal with his beloved club at the age of 39. Married to Donegal woman Shirley, Conal has four sons between the ages of 15 and eight - Sean, Peter, Danny and Charlie. The four boys have inherited their father's passion for the GAA, with Sean and Peter winning under 16 championship medals with Arva last year and Danny winning an under 12 championship. Having lived in Lucan for many years, Conal recently decided to move the family back to Arva. This has allowed him to help out with underage coaching and he is currently over the under 10s along with John Hamilton and Niall Gormley. Conal continues to work in Dublin where he is manager of Belgard Motors' Fleet Division. Conal joined the Tallaght-based company in 1981 and was instrumental in setting up the Fleet Division in 2000. Belgard Motors are main dealers for Audi, Volkswagen, Mercedes Benz, Citroen, Mazda and Porsche. The Cavan team which won the All-Ireland Masters Shield was: Martin Cahill; John Duffy, Kevin Madden, Sean Henry; Colm McBreen, James Gilchrest, Paddy McGovern; Tomas Smyth, Jimmy Galligan; Conal Conneely, Don McDonald, Packie Kiernan; Tomas Doonan, Adge King, Donal Keogan. Sub: Seamus Donohue and Tony McDonald. Tweet

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