Liam and Orlaith Buckley pictured alongside Mick Lawlor, Charlie and John O'Leary during the SSE Airtricity / Soccer Writers Ireland Awards 2022 at The Clayton Hotel in Dublin. Photo by Stephen McCarthy/Sportsfile
You followed me to Texas,
You followed me to Utah,
We didn’t find it there,
So we moved on....
The opening lines of the old Country song ‘My Elusive Dreams’ remind me of the bond between Liam and Orlaith Buckley.
There is an old saying that ‘behind every great man, is a great woman.’ In soccer parlance you could probably change that line to read ‘behind every great player or great manager, is a loyal and patient wife or partner.’
At the end of every St Pat’s game this season, home and away, Orlaith Buckley could be found in the media rooms of various League of Ireland clubs, waiting patiently for her husband Liam to complete interviews with the written media, MNS plus various radio stations and websites.
But then Orlaith Cunningham and Liam Buckley have been together a long time and Orlaith never tires of following her husband on what have not really been ‘elusive dreams,’ as Liam has had much success along the way. The couple grew up together on the same road in Manor Estate, in South Dublin as Orlaith explains: ‘‘We are married 28 years this year and had been seeing one for four or five years before that.’’
Liam began his career with Shelbourne and after a few seasons with Shamrock Rovers he moved to Vancouver Whitecaps in Canada, then it was back to Milltown from where Liam made his international debut against Poland in May1984 before moving to Waregem in Belgium.
Further moves to Santander in Spain and FC Montreux in Switzerland followed before another spell back with Rovers, on then to the Super Saints, Sligo Rovers and Athlone Town. And that was just Liam’s career as a player! As a manager he has served Athlone Town (twice), St Patrick’s Athletic (twice), Shamrock Rovers and Sporting Fingal.
So after all that travelling which city did Orlaith like best? ‘‘I loved the lifestyle in Spain, but we made some great friends in Belgium and we were very well treated by everybody at Waregem. We were very friendly with a few other couples at the club and they came to Ireland for our wedding.’’
‘‘Over the years I tried to get to see all of Liam’s games, but I missed his debut for Santander against Barcelona in the Nou Camp back in August 1986. Gary Lineker and Mark Hughes both made their debut for Barcelona that evening, but as we had only just arrived in Spain I didn’t have anyone to travel with; the team flew to Barcelona together.’’
‘‘This season I got to all the home games here in Richmond Park. I missed the European game away to Zalgiris and the league game against Shelbourne at Tolka Park as it clashed with Marc’s graduation night.’’
The Buckley two other son Graeme and Alex are also big Pat’s fans and Graeme does the team’s warm up before every game.
All that travelling and support was worthwhile for all the Buckley family on Sunday evening last when the 2-0 win over Sligo Rovers meant the Super Saints were Airtricity League of Ireland champions. The win meant Liam’s premier division dreams came to fruition for the second time in 14 years.
Afterwards Orlaith said: ‘‘After the win over Sligo, Liam admitted that this season’s team feels more his own that it did in 1999 because back then he inherited the team from a previous manager. As he said himself he appreciates the success a bit more because he is older and a bit wiser now.’’
Written by Sean Creedon. First published on SWAI.ie in 2013.
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