Frank McNallys âIrishmans diaryâ is always a decent read
I really liked his one last Saturday about him attending the Popeâs mass at Ballybrit in 1979.
This followed hot on the heels of his column about his more recent trip to Galway for the Moonaghan game at Pearse Stadium.
Heâs a smashing storyteller.
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The boom is back, baby.
Party on goys.
Only a matter of time til bando and the lads are swigging two hundred euro bottles of âclaretâ from the neck at the ifsa/pira Christmas party.
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Iâd a fantastic dinner in Asador with @Rocko, @briantinnion, @ClarkeyCat and @LetterkennyMan recently.
A group of gentlemen friends dining together = Things that are right.
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Steamers.
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Fucking quares.
Check shirts?
Masters of the universe coupon dining. Letâs keep the recovery going 
Powerful read this. cc @glenshane
John McGurk: âI lost my marriage, I left the house and I finished up in prisonâ
15/09/2018 - 04:10
The Declan Bogue Interview: Twenty five years ago this weekend, Johnny McGurk won an All-Ireland title with Derry. Life changed dramatically for him in retirement from football. He ended up in prison for almost six months after defrauding his employers of more than ÂŁ500,000 to feed his gambling addiction. Here, he speaks for the first time about his journey, his addiction, how he can help others in the future, and how his club, Erinâs Own, have been his saviour.
September 2, 2018. Croke Park, All-Ireland football final day, 2.30pm.
The 1993 Derry team are being honoured for their only All-Ireland title, out there on the pitch.
Itâs hot and humid in their matching suits. Some have loosened their ties and unfastened the top button. âJayz boys, sheâs close.â
Thomas Niblock, of Magherafelt and BBC Northern Ireland, has the honour of introducing his childhood heroes to step forward and take the applause.
First up, goalkeeper Damian McCusker. Then corner-back Kieran McKeever. Tony Scullion. Fergal P McCusker.
âAt right-half back,â Niblock called, âa Lavey man. His late winner against Dublin in the 1993 All-Ireland semi-final is the stuff of legend. A famous footballing name from a famous footballing family. Number five, was John McGurk.â
Out he comes to be clapped on the turf. Bald headed, clear-eyed and so, so lean looking.
Twenty five years ago, Dermot McNicholl overcooked a handpass to McGurk as they sought a winner against Dublin in the semi-final.
The wing-back retrieved the ball, cut back inside on his left foot and slotted it over.
Before they had walked out the tunnel, a Croke Park steward told Johnny not to let the Dublin fans forget about that day. And so, with the eyes of the stadium and an international audience looking on, he turned to Hill 16 and mimed a shot over the bar with his left foot.
The following day, pupils of St Patrickâs Maghera would replicate âthe kickâ to Johnnyâs sons.
A few seconds of nostalgia across a whole weekend soaked in it.
âThereâs a fantastic atmosphere in Croke Park anyway on All-Ireland final day. If you donât feel it, thereâs something wrong with you,â says McGurk now, sitting in a hotel on the outskirts of Derry city.
âThe tension of the day is there anyway, but to be standing in a line with the same players over again, aye, it was quite emotional. And enjoyable.â
Thereâs one person missing, of course. Their manager; Eamonn Coleman who died in 2007.
The year 1993 was the pinnacle. Events the next year would not so much accelerate an inevitable decline, but shunt the train off its tracks altogether.
Thursday, September 4, 1994
An apartment, Chicago, Illinois.
Eamonn Coleman has the news relayed down the phone in a trans-Atlantic call from Derry County Board chairman Harry Chivers, that, âYou are not being re-appointed.â
A day later, Colemanâs trainer Mickey Moran is interviewed for the job. News leaks out that he has the job. Perhaps he had it before the interview anyway.
The following Tuesday, a meeting is called for players and Moran at The Elk public house in Toomebridge. Accusations of lying and swearwords fill the airless room. The players are distraught by what they feel is a betrayal of Coleman.
Eamonn Coleman, the playersâ man, would not be back with this group again. He even encouraged the players to go back himself, as poison seeped out of an open wound that even though it is 25 years ago, gets a new airing this week with the publication of The Boys of â93; an autobiography of Coleman. (Sample quote from Colemanâs son Gary to a Derry selector after his father was betrayed; âYouâre only a fucking ball pumper; balls and water thatâs all youâre good for and I think youâre only a c**t.â)
âThe county board got it wrong and there is always a bit of tension there about it. It still hangs about that panel, full stop,â McGurk says.
âThereâs never a day you donât think that if we would have won another All-Ireland if Eamonn had stayed.
âI do feel his absence contributed to the fact Derry did not get back there. Big time.
âIt took a lot for Coleman to get that team where he did, because he was the personality man.
âIn 1990, I hadnât played any county football and I was 24. Then, when he came in, you felt that something could be done and players started to believe.
âColeman said âwe wull wan this, biys.â He brought the whole team together because Lavey and Dungiven, they despised each other at club level and still did, but he glued the thing together.
âYou canât underestimate how big of a playersâ man he was. Mickey Moran would have sat at the front of the bus and he was fantastic at coaching, he did all of that. Coleman would have been standing about watching if boys were on their game, joking and having a bit of craic, but he had the players wanting to play with each other.â
The players went back to play for Derry again under Mickey Moran. McGurk went back, but he was, âLike a lot of players; begrudging.
âWhen you go back like that, the heart is out of it. Like, when Eamonn had to go back to the players in the first place to tell them to go backâŚ
âMickey Moran â best coach in the world. And his variety of training, brilliant. Every night you came out there was something different and it was great to train under him. But he just couldnât do it on his own. Mickey hadnât the charisma or the personality for it. How he expected to do it all, I donât know. He underestimated the power and the personality of the group.â
Derry won an Ulster title in 1998 and have threatened from time to time since, but they never had a team like the one that McGurk was part of in 1993.
Earlier this summer, the Derry GAA Twitter account ran a fun feature, video clips of famous scores for the county team and let the public vote on their own personal favourite. Thousands went to the polls, and McGurkâs point against Dublin was the preferred option for 53% of the vote.
In a lot of ways, the final and the win over Cork was amazing, but the semi-final win was just incredible.
Man, those heights are fleeting.
May 12, 2016 - Antrim Crown Court
Judge Desmond Marrinan hands down a 30-month sentence to John Malachy McGurk for defrauding Patrick Bradley Ltd of Kilrea.
McGurk had pleaded guilty to theft of ÂŁ572,206 and 34 other charges involving fraud by abuse of his position of trust as the company accountant.
In passing sentence, Judge Marrinan stated it appeared the âexcitement and the thrill one gets out of playing at the very highest level needs to be replaced with something,â as McGurk became chronically addicted to gambling.
This demonstrated, he continued, how, âa decent man can ruin his life by succumbing to the seductive siren call of gambling.â
The judge was very kind to me, he said. âI had a lot of good references, a lot of people from both sides of the community spoke up for me and I had a great barrister and a solicitor.
The judge told me why I got it (the sentence) and how I got it and he was very fair. I would be honest â the day I got it I just thought, âfuck, this is over.â I went in and only served five and a half (months). There was a rule where if you had a low score, based on what you had done, how likely you were to re-offend, how dangerous you were. If you had less than 15 you were liable to get a few months off your sentence.
âSo I went in and attended different things in there, Gamblerâs Anonymous and so on. Just as long as you didnât mess up, be found with a phone or drugs or alcohol. So I only served five and half months. Out in October.
âI served the first week, three or four days in Maghaberry and my old mate Martin McGuinness got me moved to Magilligan very quickly.
âMaghaberry was an absolute disaster. I wouldnât have survived. It was 24-hour lockdown almost, only let out one hour a day. And you were sharing a cell.â
âI shared a cell with a big fella for a few days with a toilet on the floor. And you ate your food and everything in there. Absolute disaster.
âI got to Magilligan, and served the rest there. It was a bit more friendly than Maghaberry. Still, not the easiest thing in the world to go into prison, from where my life had come from, but it had to be done.
âMy first bet would have been when I was still in St Patâs (secondary school), probably lower sixth. I had a friend who owned dogs.
âYou get into that company where you have the odd soccer bet or whatever. Then I went to Queenâs and⌠it became a bit of a problem. I would have spent a lot of time in the bookies, not gambling a lot, but gambling often. Even before I left Queenâs I nearly didnât sit my exams because I was messing about and never went to class in third year. I did Accountancy and Business Studies. I hadnât any notes, I didnât attend classes and they came to me and said, âlook, the best that you can get there is a third (class honours) if you sit it now. But you need to go and get all your coursework up to date.â
So at that stage he copped himself on. âThat was â87. Got my work in, got a third degree and at that stage I thought âfuck thisâ, Lavey were coming good and I stepped away from gambling. We got our first championship in â88 under John Brennan and I said that gambling had to go because it would just ruin your head anyway.
âAt that stage I just parked it. Well, I didnât gamble much. An odd bet here and there but it wasnât a problem. It didnât dominate my mind.
âOnce I finished playing, I started to gamble again, probably for the adrenalin⌠until it must have been 2006.
At that stage, myself and my wife had ÂŁ50,000 in an account, sold a house here and there and I had saved up money and whatever. And I gambled the whole 50 grand. And lost it. And at that, I started to chase it.
âI canât gamble properly. Iâll give you an example. During the 2006 to 2011 period, at one stage I looked at soccer bets and I was gambling ÂŁ2,000 on a soccer bet on a Saturday. And thinking about these soccer teams for day after day after day, looking at their form. And nearly hell-bent that they were going to win on the Saturday.
âI had an account with an online bookmakers and over a period of about five or six months I was completely disciplined, just doing this soccer and winning.
âUntil one day, I had 68 grand in it. And I put on my soccer bet as normal, the soccer bet lost and by seven oâclock that evening, I had nothing left.
âI mean, I was betting on reserve teams in Turkey.
âI had no comprehension of anything. I canât gamble. As well as that, it doesnât matter how much.
âI mean, you can drink, and you fall down. But you gamble, you keep gambling and I had no concept of money. I got myself into a cloud and you woke up in the morning saying, âfuck this, I am not going back there again.â And then it would just eat at you again, and again.â
âAnd you thinking, âI have to get this 50 grand. And I owe Bradleyâs (his employer) money and I need to get it too.â
âYou find soon that you are not in your own conversation. Itâs like living a life outside of where you are. I could have been out for a meal with my wife and another couple and I was nowhere. I was sitting watching a screen behind her where there was a football game on. You arenât there. I did this for five, six years and I lived a lie.
âThe loneliest time of my life. (An) absolutely lonely period where the sweat was pissing off me at night with worry, the debt. Nobody knowing about it. You were completely on your own. It was a horrible, horrible time.
âThe gambling came out, and the money and all that and people think⌠But, the only reason I got the sentence I got was because I was able to prove that every penny that I took went straight into gambling, straight into a credit card that was put into gambling straight away.
âI didnât buy a house, didnât spend it on anything. What I did was gamble it.
âWhen it came out, I was a nervous wreck. I never contemplated suicide because of my weans (kids). My marriage was breaking up around that time. I couldnât invest my head in anything at that stage. My mind was invested in gambling.
âI always said I would never let my children down, but as a husband I was a disaster. We broke up shortly after, because there was no trust there. I had fooled her for five years of her life where she hadnât a clue what was going on. Absolutely no clue.
âIt was amazing to be out walking about and everybody, people that know you as a footballer, as a person and none of them had a clue what I was doing with my life. Living a massive lie.
âIn prison, you had the choice of getting a job, so I volunteered for the kitchen. You got ÂŁ18 a week. Peeling spuds, onions, cleaning, washing dishes, all that. You started about half seven and worked to three. The rest of the day was yours.
âI went in with some intentions. I knew my young boys would be starting their GCSE maths and James, who was fourth year, he was struggling with his maths a wee bit.
âI got my brother who was a maths teacher to send me the syllabus, the whole thing. So I started every evening just going through it methodically. I had done Maths to A Level anyway so I just did the GCSE course in the evenings and reviewed it and got myself up to speed.
âWhen I came out, I tutored James and a couple of students for a year or two.
âIt was good for my head too, to do something positive and contribute, rather than lying watching TV all the time.â
There was violence in the place.
âOne fella tried it one day. Typical, he was the biggest fucker in the place too. And something had gone wrong with him that morning and he came over and put his head right into me and I thought, âI am not going to cower down hereâ, so I looked straight into his face.
âThere were about 10 fellas in the kitchen and immediately, they all walked out to leave me on my own.â
âI was looking over at him and he asked, âwhat the fuck are you looking at?â And I said, âI can look wherever I want.ââ
âEventually he just got up and walked out, left me. That was the end of it.â
At that stage, 2016, (his children) James would have been 13, 12 (Patrick) and 10 (Mark). Very tough on them to come into a prison.
âI had a girlfriend at this stage, Helen.
But Deborah, my ex-wife came in first of all with Helen to see the conditions and if she was happy with them. And after that, Helen brought them up. And they came every week.
âBecause of my good behaviour, at times you were allowed out on a Saturday and I was allowed to go into Derry City, for five or six hours, as long as you came back in time. Every two weeks you could do that, go away and get a pizza or something, some time away with them.
âAll you had was the end of the phone to speak to your children and Helen so it was great to have those five or six hours rather than sitting in a room, in a prison.â
How do you rebuild a life after that? Brick by brick.
You start with the constants; his sons James, Patrick and Mark. Even when it all came out, they told him, âI love you anyway, daddy.â
He has a fourth child now, with Helen; little Fiadh, his first daughter and a girl that his sons have âspoiled into the ground,â sitting there laughing at every little thing she does.
For two people that went through what they went through, he has a good relationship with his ex-wife Deborah, who lives in Maghera now.
They share the children but sure the boys are on the Lavey field most nights of the week anyway.
Which is the other, unyielding, constant.
On May 30, 1992, a number of Lavey players dashed from a Greenlough pitch during a championship game against Newbridge.
Hugh A McGurk, in attendance to watch his sons and his club, took ill and passed away aged 76 years.
The game was abandoned. Naturally, it was a night that his son Johnny will never forget.
âThe following year we were preparing to play Down in the Ulster Championship in Newry,â he recalls. âA few days before the game, Eamonn took me aside. Away from the rest of the players, he spoke quietly. He asked me did I know what date the game was on.
âMy fatherâs anniversary,â I replied.
ââSo, youâll be delivering a big performance then,â he said. âYouâre on (James) McCartan.ââ
For his father, for his club, he held McCartan scoreless that day in Newry. McCartan was taken off and McGurkâs hands were sore from grabbing his jersey all day. Now, he passes on his talents.
He captained this club to an All-Ireland football Championship in 1991. He lost five Ulster club hurling finals. The club has been good to him and he gives everything back.
Young James is with the minors on a Monday night. The following night Patrick is out with the under-14s, Saturday mornings is Mark with the under-12s. Johnny coaches the under-16s and 12s.
Thereâs barely a night that he isnât on the Lavey pitch with some team or other. And afterwards if there is a kick-about on the estate up the road, he will give another half hour of detailed coaching before finally heading indoors.
He doesnât attend Gamblerâs Anonymous.
âWhat I found was a lot of men just want to listen to themselves. And tell the same story week after week after week,â he says.
âI just say, I canât gamble, because I canât. We have a family of 13. My whole family stood by me and backed me in everything.
âMy friends from home, my clubmates, the whole GAA community stood by me and I always believe that if I ever fucked up again, I couldnât look for them. Because I let them down again. They backed me and stayed with me through all this and I canât gamble.â
âThe story about the 68 grand says everything about me. If you gave me a million pounds and stood me outside a bookies, I would spend that million in a day. I wouldnât have had a concept of what I was betting on.â
He continues: âLavey were very strong for me. And I went back to training teams, there were no issues with that. They told me to go back, do my own thing again and I just started to live life again. I met Helen in the middle of 2013 so she was there for me.
âShe was a local girl, she played camogie for Lavey and won an All-Ireland intermediate with Lavey a few years back. She was there for me, very strong for me when I was down about things, kept my head up when I would have thoughtâŚ
âLike, the whole time waiting for the sentencing and that⌠Just depression. And the gambling left you with a real depression as well, it was one of the things about it, waking up and the lowsâŚ
âBut she was very strong for me the last number of years, my family, the club. All good to me.â
This modern-day scourge is everywhere. Only this February the GAA voted at Congress to ban all sponsorship from gambling companies but on purely practical terms that changes nothing.
âOnline is serious. I know from my own parish a lot of young fellas will gamble. Most of them will be normal but a lot of them will be spending more than they can (afford),â says McGurk.
âI met a bank manager not that long ago. And she said, the amount of accounts they see with people overspending with gambling is ridiculous. She said itâs going to be an epidemic shortly.â
âShe said even somebody that earns ÂŁ100 a week will be spending ÂŁ110 a week on gambling. Someone who earns ÂŁ400 a week, will be spending ÂŁ500 on gambling. It is rife, particularly within GAA as well.
âGambling just seems to be an easy outlet for GAA people.â
Every morning he rises at half six and within an hour, he is on a building site fitting windows. As a sideline he does accounts work for some self-employed friends and a bit of tutoring here and there. He even went back to some accountancy work for a while but got fed up with it and prefers the sites.
âYou know something, you see your head? Thereâs nothing going through your head about having to complete something and I had years and years of waiting for a court case and my head was away,â he says.
âSome days you walk out, fit a lock of windows and there is no stress. And I am fit to do it. How long can I keep it going though? Even though I was an accountant I am still strong enough to do this when I can, but I must be fresh as well.â
He holds ambitions in life and football.
Over the last several years there has been an enormous push in the Erinâs Own Lavey club at underage. While Johnny, his brother Collie, and the Downeys and so on won an All-Ireland club in 1991, they havenât won a county football title since 1993.
In hurling, they sit second in the roll of honour with 18 titles, but it was 2010 since the last one. Building their superb facilities, shared with the Termoneeny community group was a risk at the time, but has enabled them to grow their underage structures and along with Magherafelt and Bellaghy, those trio are hoovering up the underage titles.
In time, he would like to take the senior team again, when the fruits of the underage work ripen. The last time he did so was 2006, but the circumstances for team and manager were all wrong.
And if anyone wishes to talk to him about gambling, he is available.
âI have let a few boys know that I would be available if ever anybody needed me, because I suppose for any young fella, I am the biggest case of falling flat on your face with gambling there is,â he sums up.
âThere were others, like OisĂn McConville, Mark Hehir from Galway and that, but I am the one who did time, probably the biggest fall anyone had.
âIn a way, if they want to see the worst-case scenario, they could come to me. I nearly lost my children, I lost my marriage, I left the house and I finished up in prison. So I suppose if anybody wants to see what it can do to you, well thenâŚâ
The last thing he wants is for any of this to sound trite. This is not a happy ending. Redemption is fleeting. There is no such thing when events like these occur. You can only make it as good as it can be.
He insists that relationships have been destroyed, but what he will also realise but not say is that other relationships have flourished between him and the people he holds dear.
The man who walks down the street and gossips about him stealing or gambling, he cannot help. It is not within his gift.
âI donât feel sorry for anyone who holds ill-will to me. I donât owe them an apology.
âBut I do feel hurt for the people who I harmed.
âI feel remorse for all the people I offended.
âAnd I will carry that with me
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Fucking bollox. Sweep sweepery of the archetypal gaa variety.
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Not a word about the poor fucker he stole half a million from. Remorse. Five months in jail. Jokeshop.
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Ridiculous. Should be a lien on his wages for years to pay them back, what use is jail in this scenario. Out for a pizza ffs.
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Was he a Chartered Accountant?
I very much doubt it.