Mickey Tobin SFC Medal Winner 1945
Mickey Tobin, third from right in front row. Selector on the Junior football western and County winning teams of 1973.
When the sad news broke early this week of the regretted death of one of our club vice presidents Mickey Tobin in Dungarvan hospital, the Dungarvan club had lost one of its most distinguished members in its long history both on and off the field.
Mickey was highly regarded as a true gentleman inside and outside the club and our sincere sympathy is extended to his relatives and his lifetime friends, Terry Donnolly and Tom Cunningham.
From Killineen, the Pike, Mickey was first mentioned in the Dungarvan club when he played at wing forward on our minor football team in the Western final in 1941 and the following year he won a County minor hurling medal.
However, Mickey’s first love was football and in 1943 he made his debut on the club’s senior side and he made the corner forward position his own for the next thirteen years.
How good a footballer Mickey Tobin was is seen in he winning five senior championship medals with the club, four in a row from 1945 to 1948 and his fifth medal was won in 1954 when he was coming to the end of his playing career. Mickey also played in the 1956 decider when Mt. Sion deprived him of another County medal on a score of 3-2 to 2-4. He had also played in the finals of 1949 and 1950.
Our late vice president was involved with the County senior football team that lost out to Tipperary by 3-8 to 3-3 in the 1949 Munster championship and he was on the junior team that drew with Limerick in 1950.
His playing days coming to an end, Mickey served on the club committee in 1952 and he held the position of Vice Chair in 1958. The same year he was elected one of the Western Board delegates, a position he held until he retired from it in 1965.
Always interested in the future of the club, Mickey served on our first ever under age committee in 1971 while he was a selector on our Western and County junior football winning team in 1973.
In 1974 he assumed the role of club chairman and four years later he was back on the sideline again as one of our intermediate football selectors.
The club celebrated its centenary in 1985 and Mickey Tobin was selected at corner forward on our club team of the century. In his later years, Mickey was always interested in the fortunes of the club, regularly enquiring in how we got on in games and he was always a great supporter of our club’s activities.
His contribution to the club over many years was such that he was unanimously elected one of our vice presidents in the late 1900’s an office he held up to the day of his death.
In his nineties when he died, many of Mickey’s generation are gone before him but he will always be regarded in the Dungarvan club as one of our greatest on and off the field. May the sod of the Dungarvan he loved rest lightly on his noble breast.
