We’re blessed with great golf courses in Ireland, 430 and sharing with Scotland 300 out of 400 Links courses on the planet! GB has a Links feel but is definitely parkland…..with a Links twist, on the sea, wind blowing, crater like bunkers, super fast greens and lawn like fairways, on a beautiful summer evening as the sun sets out over the Atlantic as we walk down the back 9, it’s absolutely stunning, but paradoxically when the weather god gets cross, the course becomes a monster, think Carnoustie during the ‘Open’ and a decimated field of top pro’s who can’t handle it, well, we play in that every other week! That’s golf on the west coast of Ireland, it’s tough, no target golf here in perfect conditions with sun lotion in high demand, this is Galvin Green wet gear territory and woolly hats, fading your drives carefully so they don’t end up in the Atlantic swell, but it’s a fascinating challenge, when you get 35 stableford pts here you know you’ve earned them, 20mph winds at Augusta, sure that’s a grand day here!
Of course it’s now my home course, having the pleasure of being domiciled a 5 iron from the 1st tee, I could be accused of being slightly biased in my judgement but in my opinion it’s a top drawer course, tough & challenging with magnificent scenic views out over the Atlantic towards the Aran islands and next stop …… New York, just 3000 miles away!
Yesterday while Sergio was finally sealing the deal at Augusta on what would have been Seve‘s 60th birthday, we had our own ‘Masters‘ at GB! Played over Sat/Sun, it personified everything about golf in Ireland, 150 on Sat and a day for shorts while Sunday was in a gale and wet gear! And to highlight our brilliant little white ball game, there were four ’39’s’ with a lady, Jeanette, winning our ‘Green Jacket’ on BOT, and she won it playing in the Sunday gale, that’s golf!
Everything about the Club is good, from Barry the Manager to Damien, Head Greenkeeper (who spent last summer in Rio working at the Olympics!), Peter (former All Ireland Hurling keeper), the boys & girls behind the bar, El Presidente John and a cohort of members who embrace the great game with enthusiasm. The Clubhouse is a magnificent ‘home from home’, welcoming to members & guests alike, since joining it’s become our ‘spiritual home’, apres golf, for ‘tea & scones’, maybe Chowder full of local seafood, and possibly even a few ‘aperitifs’ while we analyse another day of missed birdie opportunities and ‘what might have been’?
………Malta. It’s a great place! I lived there for a year back in ’08, I was out at the University and stayed on and worked in a Language school in Sliema and go back every year and work in the school for a month, sort of a working holiday, and it pays the rent!! We were out there for 5 days in December, due to that kind Mr O’Leary we got flights for €50 rtn!!
I lived in St Julians and we always stay around there, it’s a great spot, lovely bars & restaurants and at weekends it’s the main area for nightlife for the whole island! At the top of St Julians is Paceville (pronounced Pash-a-ville), it’s wall to wall nightclubs, I suppose their Temple Bar!! Not to be missed for young people!!
The island is small, only 17 miles by 10, so you’re never far away from anywhere, no matter where you stay. Valetta is the capital, beautiful place with amazing architecture, just stroll down Republic St, visit St John’s Cathedral (Latin Mass on Sunday’s), and at the bottom, The Pub, where Olly Reed died during filming Gladiator, he was on a bender, they have turned the bar into a wee shrine!
From Valetta you can get buses anywhere, very cheap, in fact until 2 yrs ago they had old London buses from the 60’s, they were brilliant and only 47c anywhere, sadly the EU got rid of them! St Julians is about 30 mins from Valetta, through Sliema, loads of bars and restaurants, the Dubliner a great Irish bar (my local!), just ask for Paul or Carl and say you know me!) Up the hill in Spinola Bay you will find restaurants galore, Peppinos for a romantic night overlooking the Bay, and the Avenue, brilliant, great value! Just on a bit then is Paceville, you’ll find it! You’ll also see a big business tower block at the Hilton Marina and at the top is ‘Club 22‘, a nightclub 22 floors up in the sky!
Further up the island is Bugibba & St Paul’s bay, more touristy and cheaper than St Julians, all comparative as everywhere is cheaper than Ireland, Brandy €2, pints €2.50, meal for two, steaks, wine, Irish coffees, €50!!
Further on then is Melliha and then the ferry to Gozo, another island, 20 mind across, it’s beautiful, like Donegal in the 60’s with sun!! If you’re researching wedding venues, I’d recommend Ta Cenc, it’s wonderful!
There are great wedding venues across Malta, old Palazzos I think they’re called, beautiful old buildings. In the middle of Malta is Mdina, the ancient capital, the silent city, worth a visit. Famously the island has 365 churches and all look like the Vatican, mad Catholics out there you know!! It’s a great place for a wedding, usually a couple a week from Ireland and a third of the price, and they put on a brilliant day!
If you’re into history it’s a great place, walking history, been invaded by everybody, Arabs, Brits, Napolean, and one day in 1942 Valetta was the most bombed place in the world during WW2! Loads of old Roman ruins and heritage sites.
The only drawback might be lack of sandy beaches (if you’re a beach person!) it’s mostly sort of stony places but up north there are small sandy beaches, one near the Radisson is nice. It’s a paradise for diving if you’re into deep sea stuff and there are great boat trips to Gozo & Blue Lagoon, definitely go there!
Now the most important fact – Golf️! Or lack off more like! There is only one golf course,the Royal Malta Golf Club, near Valetta on way to the airport at Marsa. It’s ok not great but expensive, €80 and no open days! €50 with a member if you can make some contacts! Lovely new clubhouse but golf is still a bit elitist in Malta, bit like Ireland back in the day, so mind your p’s & q’s!!
So that’s about it, can’t think of much else, car hire is cheap but mad drivers! Maltese bread is beautiful, try a bacon Ftira! Cisk is the local beer, good, Guinness is expensive!
It’s an amazing little ‘rock’ wedged between Europe & North Africa, Sicily on one side and Tunisia & Libya the other! While Independent since 1964 the dynamic on the island is interesting with divisions reflecting previous British & Italian connections! But all in all a great place to visit, the vernacular is Maltese but most speak English as well, with language schools a major industry on the island. Weather is beautiful most of the year but July/August/Sept high humidity & 40o+, November excellent, like the best Irish summer day ever! Go for it!🏻
………Nov 12 1969, almost 45 years ago was a very special night in my young life, it being the very first time I stepped foot in Paradise to witness what would become a lifetime obsession, the team clad in green & white hoops plying their exhilarating version of the beautiful game! Browsing through the last issue of MT90M, David Potter‘s article on ‘Great European Nights‘ really brought back so many great memories, and his interesting take of events on the night I could concur with readily! As a 15 year old it was my introduction to a special place, the spiritual home of the Irish Diaspora and especially the Donegal ‘bog savages’, the Famine people who had flooded into Glasgow from gaoth Dobhair, Glenties, Inishowen, Fanad & Termon, where my Mother’s people had made the well trodden path from, economic emigrants who had sought a better life in the industrial metropolis along the Clyde. That they would find prosperity amid sectarianism & bigotry and become part of the Scottish-Irish story is just part of the social history of the 20th century and they also personify the real story of Celtic football club.
I probably wasn’t aware of all the complicated variables as I headed to Aldergrove (Belfast Int) that morning to make the first step of a lot of firsts that day, my first flight, first time in Glasgow, first time in Paradise, first time to see Celtic, first goal (or 3), yea, it was one of those special days ! On arriving at the airport it soon became apparent we would be going nowhere soon as fog surrounded the whole place. This was 11am and as each hour passed the airport filled up with supporters bedecked in the old style scarfs (long before replica jerseys), and the bar was doing a roaring trade! I think some ‘aperitifs’ might have been consumed, even at that tender age, probably purchased by our elders outwitting the under pressure bar staff! It was a long few hours and despair was beginning to set in when the intercom announced our flight was leaving but now the fog had shifted to Glasgow and we were going to Edinburgh! At least we were in the air although the consumed lager wasn’t enough to prevent palpitations as I looked out from several thousand feet at the Antrim topography beneath me!
The Short flight to the cultural capital of Scotland was made to the echo of a well fuelled Celtic choir ‘on tour’, it was great fun for a first timer and increased the expectations of what lay ahead. On reaching Edinburgh we were herded into coaches to take us to Glasgow, but with the imbibing of copious quantities of liquid and hitting Glasgow at rush hour, it was with relief to find an oasis of toilets at St Eunocks!
On the bus I met up with 4 older guys from Ballymena including a Priest and told them my plan to head to Clydebank to meet up with the Scottish cousins, aunts & uncles, the manifestation of the Donegal diaspora, but the Ballymena guys soon made me realise the logistics didn’t allow for the scenic route pre match! They said for me to accompany them and they would get me to Clydebank après match, well that was the plan! We went for something to eat and then hopped in a black hack for the short journey up the Gallowgate, another first for me, but even these seasoned travellers were consumed by the sense of camaraderie which is palpable on big European nights at Paradise. The Priest said to me to just stay close to them when we reached the ground but as we alighted the hack, and I was suddenly swept along in the tsunami of fans flooding the surrounds of the stadium, I never seen the Ballymena guys again!
It was awesome, the crowds, floodlights, noise, the cool crisp air of a November night, a tingle of excitement ran through me and I wasn’t even in the stadium yet! It’s an incredible feeling which I still get all these years later, that magical feeling as you arrive from the Gallowgate on big European nights, the floodlights in the distance, the TV camera vans, programme sellers, chip vans, groups of fans singing, the variety of accents, Dublin, Belfast, Donegal, London, Highlands, Borders, Connemara, New York et al, the merging of the Celtic family, the Irish diaspora descending on their spiritual home in the East End, it’s not just football, it’s much more than football!
I made my way into the stadium, at the old ‘Rangers’ end, about 10 mins before kick off, and 80,000 had assembled, it was a sight to behold. I decided to make my way round to the ‘Celtic’ end (as you could in those less corporate days), and squeezed my way along the front of a bouncing Jungle, which was an experience to say the least. Eventually I reached a position behind the goals and then before I found my breath, big Gemmell had busted the net at the other end, bad positioning on my part! The place was ecstatic and when Willie Wallacey pounced for a second I was in a state of induced euphoria amid being hugged and kissed by big men all around me, and then just like David Potter, a wee old man handed me a bottle of wine to take a sip to celebrate, and on hearing my Belfast accent, promptly announced, ‘send that Paisley guy over here and we’ll sort him out’! Of course this was Nov ’69, just 3 mths after Orange mobs & ‘B’ Specials had launched an onslaught on the Falls Road and things would just never be the same again, and also my first experience of Celtic and politics , it wouldn’t be the last!
The adrenalin was almost drowning me in an emotionally charged atmosphere, the haunting slow chant of Cel-Tic, Cel-Tic, drifting over the old stadium in the dark mid winter air, the Merry Ploughboy, sung with gusto (and several salutations added to our gracious Monarch!), the Irish national anthem belted out with a fervour I had never experienced before, ( we had to leave the picture houses early before a foreign anthem was played at home!), it was raucous , decidedly revolutionary in a football sort of way, anti establishment and great fun, we were 2nd class citizens in a dysfunctional state on one hand and descendants of the Famine people on the other, an eclectic mix, the ‘bog savages’, the diaspora, ‘unrepentant Fenian bastards’, but on this night we were ecstatic as we witnessed the Hoops dismantle one of the giants of European football, with the great Eusebio directing the orchestra, the ‘Black Panther’ was magic, on the same level as Georgie Best, Maradona & Messi, but we had ‘Jinky’ & Bobby Murdoch, and they had no answer to the power play of one of the truly great teams of a magical era. Harry Hood would add a 3rd with a delicate header and we were in dreamland (the drama of capitulation & tossing the coin lay ahead !), but it was magical stuff, we were witnessing a phenomenon but didn’t appreciate it, a wee team from Glasgow swashbuckling their way through Europe putting all opposition to the sword.
I was one very happy young person emerging from Paradise onto the London Road that November night, carried along in that seething mass of humanity, all 80,000 of them, there was just one problem, they knew where they were going, I didn’t!!
How the hell was I going to get to Clydebank, it might as well have been Inverness for all I knew and no iPhones in those days, we hadn’t even colour TV! I jumped on a bus which luckily was going into town, might have ended up in Kilmarnock if had boarded the other side! Some friendly fellow passengers and the conductor gave me great directions for Buchanan St where I boarded the last bus and on that wet cold November night eventually arrived at my destination, although not after informing the conductor that my Aunt lived in Glasgow Road…….which to my dismay stretched from Partick to Dumbarton!! To use that well worn cliche, ‘All’s well that ends well’, I eventually tapped on their door (after spending 10 mins knocking the ‘close’ door first!), and finally 15 hrs after leaving Belfast found myself in the welcoming surroundings of part of that Donegal diaspora who had settled ‘across the water’!
That was the start of an exhilarating experience following this special football team. I was back in March for another 3-0 demolition of Fiorentina in front of 75,000 and then in April for the total destruction of ‘Super Leeds’, England’s finest, with 135,600 (and probably 20,000 more), at Hampden. That was my greatest experience in football, an unrepeatable night witnessing total football from a Celtic team as we were squeezed tightly in behind the goal at the ‘Celtic’ end and had close up views of first Bremner’s great effort, which was then rendered meaningless by big ‘Yogi’ and my favourite player of all time, Bobby Murdoch. My first 3 experiences in football, it could only go one way after that! Unfortunately that final in ’70 proved such an anti climax, just like Brazil in 1950 or Hungary in ’54, we just couldn’t cut it when immortality lay before us, but c’est la vie, that’s football, but for Celtic supporters, it’s more than football, ‘mess que un club’, the dream lives on!!
……Sometimes in our lives there are moments which defy normal explanation, not everyday stuff but sporting excellence on a monumental scale, Wednesday night produced one such occasion! Sport is the opium of the masses, there has to be more to life than the mundane, the boring predictability of the familiar, nights like Wednesday at the Camp Nou provided that!!
But not everyone was happy, I had a call from a big mutual friend from Letterkenny just as Roberto administered the coup de grace to PSG, ranting about the ref & dodgy penalties, honestly!
I suspect there is begrudery towards the respect Barca get worldwide as ManU fans think they should get it??? But the mindset of ManU fans is difficult to fathom, bit like Kerry people who would never accept Tyrone were the best team for a decade post Millenium!
Now no offence to some dear old friends who regard Old Trafford as some sort of ‘Theatre of Dreams’ (a grand description dreamed up by a slick PR man!), but Barca ARE a special team, and whatever some might think, IT IS more than football, not unlike Algeria’s FLN team, Al Ahly in Egypt (ironically nicknamed the Red Devils!) and Celtic of course, et al!
These are teams with history absolutely nothing to do with football and thus attract this massive ubiquitous support! Honestly guys do you think 60,000 flock to Paradise regularly just to see Patrick Thistle while yet more than half the EPL clubs only get 20,000 in the ‘best league in the world’??
The worldwide Scottish/Irish diaspora see the club as something more than football and the same goes for Barca! The problem for those who support English football clubs is that it’s all they are, just football clubs, nothing else, and they just don’t get it??!
What happened on Wed night will probably never happen again in our lifetime! Certainly there have been other iconic moments, that’s what makes football ‘the beautiful game’!
All great comebacks in their own right but personally my two special moments that I was privileged to be at; Celtic coming from behind to beat Leeds in 1970 (England’s best by a mile then for those born since the Millenium!) in the EC semi at Hampden in front of 136,500, even the Camp Nou couldn’t compare!
And Donegal dismantling the Dubs at Croke Park in 2014 in front of 82,000, after going 9-4 down in 20 mins! Both great footballing spectacles over 4 decades apart, the magic of football that’s why we love it!!
But in my humble opinion what we witnessed the last night in the Camp Nou was something approaching a paranormal experience!! Ok we all know football isn’t more important than life & death to paraphrase Bill Shankly, but the ‘beautiful game’ is a distraction from the hum drum of everyday life, from Bingo or the drama of ‘Strictly for the Birds’ in the Craoibhin or darts in the ‘Anglers‘; Quiz nights in Nora’s or country music in the Lagoon, GAA points on the Burn road or soccer scores by the Lurgy! Nights like last Wednesday don’t happen very often if ever, when they do we should savour them and the practitioners, ‘Mes Que un Club‘!!
Only Our Rivers 