Players recall Embassy triumph

This year marks the 21st anniversary when a group of players from Meath overcame the odds - and highly fancied opponents from Ulster - to claim an All-Ireland snooker title. The Embassy Navan side won the 1991 Murphy Irish Stout All-Ireland Club Championship overcoming hot favourites Parkside Snooker Club, Belfast in the final at Killarney. They were the first team from the Republic to take the crown. Made up of players who mostly came from Navan the Embassy team also included the 17-year-old Colm Gilcreest a richly talented youngster from Kilmainhamwood who went on to join the professional ranks. It was the days when Alex 'Hurricane' Higgins, Steve Davis and Denis Taylor were regularly seen on TV screens as snookermania gripped the country. And for many local followers of the game who wanted show their talents in potting the black the now closed Embassy snooker centre in Navan was the focal point. The Embassy Navan team consisted of Robbie Murtagh, Frank Moran, John Blake, Gilcreest, Pat Waters and Thomas Reilly who just a few years previously had won the All-Ireland billiards title. Thomas 'Toss' Reilly, who was also manager of the team, has since sadly passed away. Each year a tournament is held in Thomas Reilly's honour. This year will be the 10th anniversary of the competition. "We all played a lot of snooker at the time, we would have practiced just about every night," recalls Moran. "That was the third year we were in the championships, snooker was a lot more popular than it is now." The Embassy Navan selection played their way through a tough regional qualifying round to make it to the finals in Killarney. Following the early round robin series three teams qualified for the semi-finals. However in Group B, which included the Navan side, the contest proved to be particularly tight. The Embassy, Jason's (Dublin) and the holders Kennedy Way had to go to a play-off to decide what team would progress to the last four. The one-frame play-offs turned out to be "nerve-wrecking" according to a contemporary account of the tournament in the Evening Herald however Embassy made it through. In the semi-finals the Royal County side faced New Institute, Nenagh who had won Group A. There was little between the teams but it was Gilcreest (who despite his youth was ranked number seven in the country) who displayed the talent and temperment to defeat the experienced Ger Lovett 3-2 and secure a place in the final. Parkside were considered the strongest club side in Northern Ireland by some distance. Nerves from both sides were evident over the five frame matches. The Embassy side once again showed they had nerves of steel by staying calm and winning three of the first four matches to take the championship, the £1,000 cheque, crystal bowls and a specially commissioned jersey. Gilcreest went on to become Irish champion and reach the 2008 final of the World Amateur Snooker Championship in Wels, Austria in 2008. He played against many of the biggest names in the game during a professional career that expanded from 1999 to 2006. According to Wikipedia Gilcreest's total earnings from his professional days amounted to €36,860, something that was news to the Kilmainhamwood when it was related to him. "If it's there it must be true. It's all well spent by now anyway," he added with a laugh. The All-Ireland Championships in Killarney was Gilcreest's first taste of the big time. "I remember it well, it was my first time at the championships. We had a good, steady team and it was great to win a championship like that with lads from your club," recalled Gilcreest last Friday. "We never thought we were going to win it going down. We thought we had a good chance getting to the semis but as the tournament went on we got stronger. The only top player we had at the time was Robbie Murtagh who was in the top 16 of the Irish amateurs. I was only starting out in the amateurs and the other boys were good club players." Despite the odds the Navan team broke the mould. "The Ulster teams were very strong at the time and it was getting to the stage where people were saying it was hard to see a team from the Republic winning it. We stuck together got some momentum going and won it." Gilcreest also won the Club Championship twice more, in 2010 and last month. On both occasions he was a member of a team from Celbridge. "When the Embassy closed down there wasn't many places to play in Navan, I've always played in Celbridge because there's good players there. Even now I go there a lot." Gilcreest enjoyed some memorable days in his snooker career but that tournament in Killarney 21 years ago will always remain for him a little special. The day a team from the Royal County won the All-Ireland.