Declan Mallon on early Championship wins and the rise of Two Mile House

The first jersey Declan Mallon was handed as a starting player for Two Mile House was ripped, battered and sponsorless. It was as simple as could be, plain yellow with a green sash, but it meant so much more than the sum of its parts to the young wing-back now starting for the senior team.

“I eventually got my break when one of the lads had to go working abroad,” Declan explained. “I got his jersey, it was barely a jersey at all, but I wanted to hold onto it as long as I could.”

The area around the club was a lot smaller in those days and Declan’s under-age football was largely played with Oliver Plunkett’s, an amalgamation of Eadestown, Ballymore Eustace, and Two Mile House.

It would be in Declan’s early to mid 20s when Two Mile House began to threaten the sharp end of the Junior ‘A’ Championship in Kildare.

“In 1993, we were playing Caragh in Newbridge and they absolutely annihilated us. They kicked us off the park. I got a belt in the eye and was in the back of the ambulance. I remember the two medics looking after me saying ‘there's another one gone over the bar and another one gone over’. I think we were beaten by over 20 points,” Declan recalled.”

Caragh would go on to win that year’s Championship and Two Mile House had improved on the whole, despite being on the wrong end of scutching.

The man in the dugout was Declan McGovern, an Offaly man and primary school teacher in Naas that the players and club members managed to talk into doing another year.

“We had young blood coming through like Maurice Colbert, who had won a Leinster Minor Champion-
ship medal with Kildare, and a few others too,” Declan said.

“The year we won it (1994), we were pox-lucky to get out of the first round with a one-point win. It was down to Eoin O’Connor, who was our corner-back, he made a diving save to stop a goal. That kept us in that Championship.”

It would be far from the last stumbling block en-route to the final for Two Mile House as they nearly fell at the penultimate hurdle against Rheban.

“We were always on top in that game. We were two points up, time was almost gone and they intercepted the ball and got a goal. I don’t know where the time came from because it was up, but we got the ball out quick and won a free right in the corner of the pitch in St Conleth’s. Donal Burke was our free-taker, it was a really acute angle, but he got it over and we got a draw out of it.”

The replay would throw up an issue of its own as Declan flew out to Greece the following week. While his holiday on the mediterranean was still enjoyed, the absent wing-back made sure to find a pay-phone on match day to find out the result. It was exactly what he was hoping for as news came in that Two Mile House had set up a Junior ‘A’ Championship final meeting with Maynooth.

“We got a challenge match against Sarsfields’ second team before the final, and they wanted to test me out, so they put me in midfield. I was fairly okay running, but I think they wanted to run the beer out of me,” Declan laughed.

“I played well and they didn’t know whether to start me or not for the final because they had won well in the semi-final when I was gone. I didn’t know I was playing yet, but I went to mass on the Sunday morning of the game and after that I was told I was playing right half-forward instead.”

The House would emerge 2-8 to 0-8 victors on the day and their freshly-sunned half-forward even got a couple of points from his new position in the county final. A moment of ecstasy for the club, who’s men’s side had only ever won one Championship before, a Junior ‘C’ in 1979.

“We were all in the dressing room shouting and celebrating and then suddenly I could see my father. Him and the mother would never go to matches. He was only after having throat cancer and wasn’t able to talk anymore,” Declan said.

“He got himself squeezed into the door the tiniest bit and he just gave me the thumbs up from the far side of the dressing room. I could just about see him in the corner and I remember that so vividly. He died the following year.”

Two Mile house had come a long way from the ragged jersey that Declan was first handed. A fresh jersey, socks and nicks thanks to Dennison Trailers, new gear bags courtesy of Dessie Finan, and now a Junior ‘A’ Championship to match.

The ‘94 Championship would be the peak of Declan’s playing stint at the club, which came to a close in scary circumstances during a ‘B’ final against Carbury in 2004.

“I went down to pick up a ball and met this lad head on and fractured my neck, breaking a few vertebrae. The physio was my wife. We were engaged at the time and were having the party the following weekend, but I was up in Tallaght. We won the B final anyways,” Declan explained.

Two Mile House would go on to win an All-Ireland Junior Club Football Championship in early 2014 and a Leinster Intermediate title in 2018. The club had advanced massively since Declan’s involvement on the pitch, but his participation off it remained throughout that time.

“It is unreal how well the club is doing now. You have to look after the young and those coming through, so we have always put any resources we had into that. We are going to schools and houses. One year we went down and gave a sliotar and a football to every house to try and encourage people to come out to us,” Declan said.

Declan also spoke of the brilliant support the club got during the time of the Adam Burke fun-run. He added, “We pushed for it and we got brilliant support from all around Kildare and Adam is flying now.”

It is not all off the field work for Declan in 2024 as he patrols the sideline for the Two Mile House ladies team.

“I have three kids Cassie, James and Grace. I train Cassie, the wife trains Grace, and somebody else trains James. I started off with Cassie when she was five. She is 16 now and has won an All-Ireland Gold U14 title with Kildare. She is playing senior football with the club now and is doing well,” Declan explained.

Having done his best to lay the groundwork for the success that followed, Declan Mallon is continuing his efforts to enhance his beloved club to this day.