Inside Track: Louth and Monaghan border has been crossed many times

Tommy Durnin is not the only county player to cross the Louth/Monaghan border and then make it back. Stefan White did the same, achieving success in his adopted county and again on his return.

As is well known by now, midfielder Durnin is to line out with Ardee St Mary’s this season having spent the last few seasons with Inniskeen Grattans.

He was a Westerns clubman first of all, and for a time dismissed all overtures from other clubs, staying loyal to the Reaghstown club.

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He eventually relented, signing a transfer form that he hoped would take him to Mary’s. However, the Louth County Board weren’t having any of it; Westerns, an unsuccessful junior club, would be weakened further by the loss of their best player if the transfer was allowed to go through, was the reason given for the refusal.

Encouraging him to get involved in a higher club grade if he wanted to better his county team prospects, the then-Louth manager, Mickey Harte, suggested to Durnin to look outside the county, knowing such a transfer request couldn’t be prevented. Thus the player’s link up with Inniskeen Grattans.

Now that he’s back in the county, and along with another Mary’s acquisition, former Galway player, Brian Talty jun – a one-time partner of Dublin’s Brian Fenton at the Raheny club – Durnin will be in the blue jersey when his involvement with the county team is over.

The popular opinion is that the newcomers will partner at midfield. That might not be the case. In Seán Callaghan, Mary’s have a strapping youngster, who’s been more than a bit-player in the Ardee success story of recent years. He’ll be yielding to no-one.

Stefan White was refused a transfer to Clan na Gael in his time with his maiden club, O’Connell’s. So, like Durnin, he took himself over the county border, in his case to Castleblayney Faughs.

In addition to changing clubs, he togged out in his adopted county’s colours, and was a winner, helping the Farney to an Ulster title in 1988, and playing against Cork in the All-Ireland semi-final. He also won Monaghan senior championship medals.

White returned to Louth club and county team football, linking with the club he had wished to join years earlier. And in the Clan na Gael colours, he won the county’s highest honours on a few occasions.

There’s a list of Monaghan county players who joined Louth clubs. Back in the early 1940s, Jack Crawley switched from Inniskeen Grattans to Young Irelands, and won a championship medal with the Dundalk club.

Later, Joe Carroll (the other one) and Gerry Hoey also took the short hop from Kavanagh country to Dundalk, the former lining out with Seán O’Mahony’s and Hoey with Stabannon Parnells.

Bernie Murray, a National League winner with Monaghan along with Hoey, also played with Stabannon, while another member of that 1985 team, Ciarán Murray, joined Dundalk Gaels, but not as a player. However, his twin sons, Oisín and Seán, are Gaels players.

Yet another of Monaghan’s league-winning side has crossed the border, in his case on a number of occasions. Éamon McEneaney joined up with Geraldines on his arrival here, and, as manager, guided the Haggardstown club to successive minor championship wins, the second of them in 2008.

At the time McEneaney took charge of the Louth senior side, and enjoyed more success here with a win in Division Two of the National League and the promotion that went with it. He was back in his native county a few years later filling the same management role.

This is just a flavour of the inter-changing that’s gone on between the neighbouring counties over the years. There could be others.