Rafferty's family legacy powers Glenullin's historic chase for Ulster glory

Conor Rafferty’s performance against Carrickmacross is one you’d dream of. He was absolutely everywhere.

When Gary McEneaney stretched the Monaghan side’s four-point half-time lead to five, Glenullin fans must’ve been wondering who’d turn the tide.

That man was Conor Rafferty with a point to match his searing run from deep in their defence. Ryan McNicholl’s two-pointer followed.

Darragh Mee’s goal put the brakes on again but Glenullin poured themselves back into battle. John O’Kane and Chrissy Dempsey began to win breaking balls. And Conor Rafferty, he kept on running, kept on showing and kept on linking back to front.

He didn’t lick it off the grass. His father Basil gave as much to the green and gold jersey as anyone could imagine. His late grandfather Dessie played for the club his great grandfather Johnny helped found 100 years ago.

Seated in Glenullin hall last Friday night, the excitement is evident in Conor’s voice. The biggest game of his career is nine days away. This is living.

Between winning a third title in four years and celebrating 100 years of Glenullin, it’s a generational moment.

“Everyone's just in a good mood,” he said. “Whenever the football team's doing well, everybody's doing well.

“It impacts everybody's mood, whether they're part of the team or not. You see boys putting up flags. You're driving past people's houses and the bunting is out.

“It's just unbelievable, just to see how much it means to everybody and how much people support you.

“Daddy's grandad was a founder member of the club. It's something that means a lot to us, to be part of this club. Growing up, it was like my only hobby, it's what I love doing, I've always loved doing it and I'll do it for as long as I can.”

He only has to look to his father who played well after many his age had walked out of the dressing room for the last time.

Current manager Michael O’Kane handed Conor his debut for the reserves at the age of 15. Manager Gary Coleman gave him a first senior start the following year against Foreglen.

“Instantly, the nerves just hit me straight away, I was like, ‘oh my God, what the hell's going on’. We actually got beat that day,” Rafferty said, remembering it like it was yesterday.

He was disappointed in his performance but believed he’d enough to make it as a senior player. Persistence would be the word.

Liam Bradley called him in off the bench in a 2017 championship exit to Greenlough before he made a starting debut against Coleraine the following season.

It was a night when Dermot O’Kane kicked all but one of the ‘Glen’s dozen points in a four-point defeat to eventual champions. Brian Mullan scored the other.

As the 2007 senior title ebbed further into history, Glenullin’s watershed moment came in the autumn of 2021. They needed to beat Slaughtmanus to stay out of junior football.

Slaughtmanus were deserving winners. Leaving Celtic Park, Glenullin were unaware of a league restructure coming over the horizon that saved them from the drop.

That night, as far as they were concerned, they’d be playing in the third tier in 2022.

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“It was a real damper,” Rafferty said of his darkest football moment. “I realised then, I probably wasn't doing enough myself off the pitch, I could do more to be better for the team. For me that was a turning point.”

It was time to hit the gym. When not working as a physiotherapist, Diarmuid McNicholl works alongside side Conor and his father Basil’s roof truss business. Glenullin’s two overlapping defenders under one roof.

Back then, McNicholl was in the gym recovering from his multiple years of injury hell.

Fuelled by the Slaughtmanus defeat, the younger Glenullin crew, before Paddy Bradley was even in place as manager for 2022, got to work in the gym.

They had a new vocabulary. Squats. Deadlifts. Benching. Compound lifts. Collectively, the younger core began the process of getting faster, sharper and stronger, while waving goodbye to mediocrity.

“Back in my earlier days, people weren't really holding each other accountable for things as much as what we do now,” Rafferty said.

Paddy Bradley and coach Chris Collins laid it on the line. Things had to change. The fire had to be lit by the players. Inside the white lines, it would always be their battle.

Standards is an overused buzz word. Glenullin’s version was about showing up for training more than actually just being present. Intensity was a basic requirement.

“You need to be on the pitch ready to improve in every training,” Conor said.

“It's about doing that for yourself and making sure that the boys around you are doing that.

“That brings the whole thing together, so, to me, that's what the ‘standards’ mean.

“The past couple of years, we've really honed in on that and it's taken us to places we probably didn't think we were actually going to go.”

It took them to Daniel O’Kane’s winning point to land the 2022 title. It got them into a position where Néill McNicholl’s goal bought them extra time in the final 12 months later and back-to-back glory.

It was the same against Carrickmacross. Rafferty’s run and point with the half-time messages still ringing in their ears. It helped home an inside three that have been hard to totally decommission.

Yes, they’ve rode their luck but if the graft is there, they always have a chance. Throw in the towel, then it’s a waste of time.

It brings the ‘Glen to Clones on Sunday, a first ever Ulster final a chance to dream.

“I've been there the whole year; I’ve seen the work that us boys have done. I'm confident in our ability,” he said of Glenullin’s pathway.

“Obviously Cuchulainn’s are a massive team. They're big, they're strong, they're fast, it's going to be a challenge and it'll be a tight game.

“I do believe whoever comes off the pitch as a winner will come off it as deserving winners because both teams are that dogged and they’ll die on the ball.”

Three previous generations of Raffertys have dived on balls for the good of Glenullin. Conor is following. Reverse gear won’t be an option on Sunday.

It’s the test of tests but Glenullin will hope there is one final glorious mystery still to be written in their 100th year.