Ballymun Kickhams legend Paddy Christie paid tribute to the efforts of current chairperson of the club Declan Small in helping the struggling North Dublin club get back on its feet in the 1990s.
Christie's work on the pitch with a core group of under-10s, featuring six-time All-Ireland winner Philly McMahon, and the club's recovery after falling from the forefront of Dublin football in the 1980s will be the focus of a new documentary, Passing it on, Ballymun Kickhams , to air on Eir Sport 1 tonight.
Christie and his efforts feature heavily in the documentary but he noted that everything that came after his side would have been nothing if not for the efforts of Small, the father of Dublin footballers John and Paddy.
While Christie was battling against the odds with his group, Small and then-Chairman Tom O'Donoghue helped bring along those beneath them as the club got their house slowly back in order.
"We were chaotic, things were very poor," Christie remembers.
"Summer camps wise, when I started with Philly's team, there was no camps.
"Other clubs like Kimacud, Ballyboden would have hundreds of kids at the camps. It mushroomed eventually - I think it got to four or five hundred at one stage, enormous camps.
"We didn't have anything, so I set up a couple of summer camps. We got a hundred kids - that's very good for us.
"We got people taking teams, Declan Small had this initiative and got local people around to take teams, he was very well organised. He knew what he was doing. He was a good bit older than me!
"He had an idea of how to do things and that kept it going.
"The team that I took through, that was the groundwork I suppose for the senior Championship winning team, but the stuff behind it, we were still competitive.
"That's all from what he did."
Passing It On: Ballymun Kickhams is a story of hope and persistence.
It was produced and directed by Sorcha Glackin and was funded though the support of the BAI.
The documentary airs on Monday, March 25th at 8.00pm on eir sport 1.
