Published: Friday, 25th September, 2009 9:00am

The late Frank O'Connell - A Football Tribute

On Sunday, August 23, Frank O'Connell, Hon. President of the Combined Counties Football League passed away after a short battle with illness. Naturally, Frank's passing will be most felt by his family and friends. However the sporting world will also mourn his passing with great sadness and regret. Frank loved all sport. His early life participation in athletics and his more recent passion and great work with greyhound racing has been well documented. Soccer was Frank's other great sporting past-time and throughout the greater footballing family Frank's presence will be missed. Frank has been synonymous with soccer in the Counties for the past thirty years. Birr Town was founded in 1969 by John Corboy ,PJ Hoctor and Jim Delaney (uncle of current F.A.I. C.E.O. John Delaney) and Frank first became involved in the 1973/74 season when he moved to live and work in Birr.

In that same year he played with the Birr team that reached an F.A.I. Junior Cup regional semi final. For the next couple of years he mixed his football efforts with his participation in cross-country running. In 1980 Frank concentrated on his football becoming first-choice centre-half on the senior team and with the advent of the newly-formed schoolboy league and Birr's subsequent entry into its competitions Frank became involved as a coach.

His work as a coach was fruitful, leading teams to underage success and more importantly providing a rich flow of talented players who would ultimately bring senior club success.

Many of those players still play and are involved with the club today and remember Frank fondly. In 1988 he was elected Chairman of Birr Town and pushed to club to further success. In 1989/90 he played with the Birr team beaten in the Sheeran Cup final and in 1991 Frank was a panel member with the first Birr team to win a Counties Cup. After that, Frank played and managed the Birr Town seconds team which went on to win three leagues in three seasons.

In the early 90's Frank realised that Birr Town needed a permanent home of their own and so he along with fellow worker John Normile and the Birr Town club development group set about building the magnificent setting of Woodfield Park. This development took careful planning, dedication and hard work and the true testament of Woodfield Park is that it still remains one of the best soccer facilities in the Midlands today. The completion of the Woodfield Park project will be one of Frank's endearing legacies in football.

In 2003 Frank became Chairman of the Leinster Football Counties Committee while the demographics in football in the Counties region were changing positively with advent of the newly formed OWL League. In 2005 along with present day administrators Frank was one of the key personnel who helped to form today's Combined Counties Football League.

In 2006/07 Frank was awarded the inaugural C.C.F.L. Contribution to Football Award. As a player Frank was committed, dependable and passionate. As an administrator Frank was fair, honest and straight. He was a good man, always there to help and a lot of this help for individuals and for clubs went un-noticed. One of Frank's great strengths was that common sense no nonsense approach that he always managed to portray no matter what the situation. The football family in the Counties will miss Frank and we collectively say thanks to Frank for all that he has done for football. We know he will receive his just rewards.

''Life's race well run, Life's work well done, Life's victory won, Now cometh rest.'' Edward Hazen Parker