Watty Graham's GAC, Glen

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Watty Graham's GAC, Glen
CLG Watty Graham, An Ghleann
Glen GAC Crest.png
Founded:1948
County: Derry
Nickname:Wattys
Colours:Green, Gold and White
Grounds:Watty Graham Park, Maghera
Coordinates: 54°50′23.44″N6°41′17.98″W / 54.8398444°N 6.6883278°W / 54.8398444; -6.6883278
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Men's
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Ladies'
Senior Club Championships
All IrelandUlster
champions		Derry
champions
Football: 1 2 3
Ladies' football: 0 0 19

Watty Graham's Gaelic Athletic Club, Glen (Irish : An Ghleann), is a Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) club based outside Maghera in the south of County Londonderry in Northern Ireland. Players are drawn from Maghera and some surrounding townlands. The club competes in Gaelic football, ladies' Gaelic football and camogie.

Contents

Name

The club is named after Watty (Walter) Graham, who was a resident of Maghera in the 18th century. He was an educated Presbyterian who became an Elder of his church. Frustrated at the many restrictions on his liberty, he joined the United Irishmen. At the time of the 1798 rebellion he was captured and subsequently hanged in Maghera. [1]

Camogie

Glen fields Camogie teams at U12, U14, U16, Minor and Senior levels. The senior team competes in the Credit Union Derry Premier League.

Ladies' football

Glen Ladies' football club was formed in 1995. [2] The club has won the Derry Senior Ladies' Football Championship 19 times and the Ulster Intermediate championship three times. [3]

Watty Graham Park

The club's home ground is Watty Graham Park. It was opened in 1982 by then GAA President Paddy Buggy. [4] The first game was an over-35s game, which was followed by an inter-county match between Derry and Armagh. [4] Celtic Park in Derry City is officially recognised as Derry's main county ground, [5] but Watty Graham Park has hosted a number of National League and Dr McKenna Cup games. Watty Graham Park currently has a capacity of six thousand. [4]

History

The Watty Graham club evolved from the Pearse's club formed around 1933, when Fr Anthony Doherty, amongst others, arranged a South Derry league. The club reached the 1944 South Derry final and a few of their players represented Derry. [6]

After the folding of the Pearse's club, Watty Graham's GAC, Glen, was officially formed in 1948. In the early 1950s, it competed in a number of South Derry Finals and in 1953 they defeated St John's, Mullan (a townland of Ballinderry), to win the South Derry Junior Championship. They won the same title six years later defeating The Loup in the final. 1959 also saw their first all county success defeating Faughanvale in the final.

In 1964, they won the South Derry Junior and Derry Junior Football Championship by beating Littlebridge (part of the modern day Ógra Colmcille club) and Sarfield's respectively. [6] The side repeated this feat in 1966 by beating The Loup in the South Derry Junior final before going on to win the Derry Junior final. The 1970s proved a barren decade for Watty Graham's and they have little apart from a McGlinchey Cup success in 1974 to show for it. [6] Glen opened a new social club in Maghera in April 1976.

The club won its first Derry Intermediate Football Championship in 1980. They overcame Drumsurn in the final by 0–06 to 0–03. Glen won a second Intermediate Championship in 1983 defeating Drum in the final. [6]

In 1985, Watty Graham's won the All-Ireland Óg Sport title. They competed in county, provincial and All Ireland phases to come out winners. Two years later they won the Derry Minor Football Championship with a success over Ballinascreen. The same year Glen won the Larkin Cup and also the Senior Division 1 League. The side added another Larkin Cup in 1995. Glen won their fourth and fifth Junior Championship in 2004 and 2005, the competitions this time won by the Glen Thirds team. This same Thirds team went on to win three in a row by winning the Thirds Championship in 2006.

After a prolonged period of dominance in underage football, Glen won their fourth successive Ulster Minor Championship on 1 January 2015.

Glen's current manager is Malachy O'Rourke. In 2021, they won their first Derry Senior Football Championship; in 2022, they won the county championship again, and then added the Ulster Senior Football Championship after wins over Errigal Ciarán (Tyrone), Erin's Own, Cargin (Antrim), and Kilcoo (Down). [7] [8] In 2023 Glen won their third Derry Senior Football Championship in a row, beating Magherafelt in the final.

On 21 January 2024, Glen won the 2023–24 All-Ireland Senior Club Football Championship for the first time after a 2-10 to 1-12 win against St Brigid's in the final at Croke Park. [9] [10] [11]

Football titles

Senior

Under 21

Minor

Under 16

Under-15

Under-14

Under-13

Ladies' football titles

Note 1: The above lists may be incomplete. Please add any other honours you know of.
Note 2: Most of the Ladies' honours are only updated as far as 2002. Please add any other honours you know of.

Notable players

Managers

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References

  1. ↑ "History of Watty Graham" . Retrieved 5 September 2019.
  2. ↑ "A brief history of Glen Ladies' Gaelic football team". Archived from the original on 8 August 2009. Retrieved 8 September 2007.
  3. ↑ McMullan, Michael (7 February 2021). "Watt an Era: A look back at the Glen Ladies' story". Derry Now. Retrieved 26 November 2023.
  4. 1 2 3 Scott, Ronan (20 March 2009). "Glen next stop on Derry magical mystery tour". Gaelic Life. p. 5.
  5. ↑ Scott, Ronan (13 February 2009). "'Screen to win back hearts of Derry fans". Gaelic Life. p. 3.
  6. 1 2 3 4 5 "A history of the Watty Graham Club by Eamonn Higgins". Archived from the original on 23 August 2007. Retrieved 7 September 2007.
  7. ↑ O’Connor, Christy (12 December 2022). "GAA talking points: An Ulster epic, Walsh gets his medal". Irish Examiner.
  8. ↑ Team, The42. "Glen dethrone All-Ireland champions Kilcoo and land first Ulster title". The42.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  9. ↑ "Glen go one better with dramatic win over St Brigid's in All-Ireland final". RTE Sport. 21 January 2024. Retrieved 26 January 2024.
  10. ↑ Manning, Gordon (21 January 2024). "Stunning comeback gives Glen first ever All-Ireland club title". Irish Times. Retrieved 21 January 2024.
  11. ↑ Roche, Frank (21 January 2024). "Glen produce stunning fightback to win All-Ireland senior club title". Irish Independent. Retrieved 21 January 2024.
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