Park/Ratheniska
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| Founded: | 1981 | ||||||||||||||||
| County: | Laois | ||||||||||||||||
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| Club Colours: | Green and Gold | ||||||||||||||||
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Park-Ratheniska Gaelic Athletic Association club is a gaelic football and hurling club in County Laois, Ireland.
The club was founded in 1981 after the amalgamation of Park Football Club and Ratheniska Hurling Club.
Club colours are green and gold.
The club has competed at senior level in both hurling and football with famous players like Tom Bowe, Paddy Dunne, Larry Cushen, Sean Delaney, Joe Ramsbottom and Ned Mansworth donning the colours over the years
Gaelic Athletic Association has always played a prominent role in Park/Ratheniska, dating back to a Ratheniska team in 1913, where the first signs of gaelic football in the area can be traced. This team faded away after contesting a few finals in that era, and it wasn’t until the Loughteague team in 1927 and ’28 that football began to flourish in the area when the newly formed club won two Laois Junior Football Championships under the captaincy of Liam Wall.
However the first appearance of what was to become the Park/Ratheniska GAA Club came in 1933 when the Park Football Club was founded when a Minor and Junior team were affiliated with the Laois GAA County Board. Football quickly blossomed among the locals with a Minor title coming in its first year. The real breakthrough for the club was to come in 1942 though, when they broke out of Junior ranks for the first time. Four years of Intermediate football was rewarded in 1947 when the Laois Intermediate Football Championship title came their way, and at last Senior Football was achieved.
The Park men quickly became a force to be reckoned with in senior ranks, good championship runs followed as they attempted to scale the heights of senior football in Laois. This they did in style in 1952, which was to be the club's greatest era. Trained by the famous athlete Will “Bruno” McEvoy and under the captaincy of Paddy Dunne the Park team stormed all in front of them, culminating in a famous final victory against a fancied Ballyroan side. Not content to rest on their laurels, the Park men were only to keen to prove 1952 to be no fluke, and so they duly retained the title in 1953.
After such heights a plateau was inevitable. The club's next title of note was in 1972 when they captured the Laois Junior "B" Football Championship. Local rivalry was to the fore for the club's next success when in 1978 they captured the Senior Football League final defeating neighbours Stradbally in what was described as an “epic contest”.
It was during this period of success for Park Football Club that another club was coming to prominence in the area. The Ratheniska Hurling Club had been founded in 1953, running along side the Park Football Club, while primarily using many of the same players as the footballers. The club took its first ever-hurling title in 1958 when it clinched the Laois Junior Hurling Championship title. Success agreed with the Club early on, and a defeat in the Laois Intermediate Hurling Championship final of 1960 was followed up quickly with a win in the very same in 1961. The infant club had grown up quickly and in a mere eight years of existence was performing at the highest level in Laois.
However following ten years at senior level the move was taken to return back to junior ranks where success came quickly again in the form of the 1971 Laois Junior Hurling Championship title. A Laois Intermediate Hurling Championship title followed in 1977 as the club again ascended through the ranks.
In 1981 however both clubs underwent their greatest change when it was decided it would be best for all, to amalgamate the Park G.F.C and the Ratheniska Hurling Club under the one name, the Park/Ratheniska GAA Club. The new club had to wait six years for its name to be carved on a trophy, but this came along in 1987 when the Junior Hurlers did the League and Championship double. The footballers took their lead from this and stormed their way back to Senior ranks in 1988 when winning the Laois Intermediate Football Championship final on a wild and windy day in O'Moore Park.
1994 was to prove one of the most trophy laden years in the club’s history. The Laois All-County Football League Division 2 trophy was collected first, and was then followed up by the hurlers doing the league and championship double as they marched back to senior ranks again.
Another chapter in the club's history was written in 2003 when the junior hurlers picked up the Championship trophy in dramatic circumstances in O Moore Park.
2006 proved to be a monumental year in the club's history as the Junior A footballers railroaded all in their path. It began with the Laois Junior Football Championship when Cathal Óg Greene hoisted aloft the trophy in O Moore Park after Barrowhouse had been defeated on a scoreline of 1-13 to 0-08.
From there they kept up their momentum culminating in a never to be forgotten December day in Ratheniska when St Ultans of Meath were defeated 2-8 to 1-8 in the Leinster Junior Club Football Championship Final. A last minute goal from the diving Johnny Nevin in what will forever be known as "Nevin's Square" from this point forward, was the defining moment of a titanic game in which the players wrote their names down in the Club's history books forever. There were scenes of euphoric joy on the field afterwards as captain Cathal Óg Greene accepted the trophy from Leinster Council Chairman Liam O'Neill, in doing so rubber stamping the club's first ever provincial title in front of the whole community.
