Rian O’Neill remembers Crossmaglen faithful departed as Rangers win 48th Armagh title

CROSSMAGLEN were trailing Madden by six points in the third of their three championship group games when Rian O’Neill took the field as a half-time substitute.

O’Neill, who had missed Armagh’s entire Ulster Championship-winning season and most of his club’s league campaign, scored a two-point free and although Cross eventually lost by a point their form line turned upwards after that game and despite occasional blips it kept heading that way.

Sunday’s win against Killeavy brought the club a 48^th county title and if any have been celebrated more joyously, well, it must have been some party in South Armagh.

The return of their 2024 All-Ireland-winner and Allstar, such a superb all-round footballing force with top-drawer physicality and ability, was a massive moral boost for his club but that’s not the way he sees it.

“I don’t know about me giving the club a lift, the club gives me a huge lift,” said O’Neill.

“I love wearing the black and amber. We grew up in Cross wanting to be up in the field and playing and we’re trying to inspire the next generation of players to keep carrying on the torch and get the club back to where it should be.

“It’s a special day any time you pull on the jersey.

“We don’t have a God-given right to come here and win, maybe at one stage we thought we did. The hard work was put in and we left no stone unturned preparing for Killeavy and thankfully we got over the line.

“It’s very sweet and it’s great to get back and up them steps (at the Athletic Grounds).”

As celebrations went on around him, O’Neill spoke of the faithful departed who weren’t there to join them - former players Caolan Finnegan and Oran Marron and his grandmother Margaret McConville whose grandsons contributed 10 points to Sunday’s victory.

“We’ve been trying for two years to win the cup back for Caolan,” he said.

“He was taken away from us far too soon and our fighting spirit showed today in the second half when the chips were down.

“It’s not mentioned all the time but it’s constantly in the back of all our heads and some of the boys were great friends with him and Oran Marron as well who was the same age and we lost him as well in the club.

“My own granny passed away and this is the first county final she wouldn’t have been at. So there’s people watching over us and today we were men on a mission and we were taking home the cup to Cross today no matter what.”

Just a fortnight previously, Crossmaglen had gone in at half-time trailing Clann Eireann by 14 points. Sunday’s scenes would have been unimaginable at that stage but Crossmaglen refused to lose that semi-final and Killeavy, who had their nose in front midway through the second half in the final, weren’t able to break their spirit either.

“It wasn’t looking good at half-time against Clann Eireann but we came out at the start of the second half and reeled out two-pointer after two-pointer,” said O’Neill.

“Then we hit a bit of a lull and I got sent off. John McEntee said during the week that I wasn’t the first innocent man from Cross accused of doing something! I was delighted to get off.

“The scenes after the semi-final were brilliant, they showed what it meant to us to get over the line in a tight game but there was nothing won. We came here today with a job to do and thank God we did it.”