Vinnie Perth, Dane Massey, and Ciarán Kilduff sat down with Balls.ie to commemorate and remember their legendary squad who reached the Europa League group stages in 2016-17.
Perth was assistant manager to Stephen Kenny during that time, while Massey and Kilduff were integral members of the squad.
The three men highlight how the squad was not put together with a huge amount of money. Kilduff was on the bench for St. Patrick’s Athletic when he signed for the Lilywhites, while Massey was playing for Bray Wanderers and available for anyone to come and poach him.
One player who made a lasting in pact in Dundalk was Richie Towell, and he was signed from Leinster Senior League side Bluebell United in 2013. Despite leaving from Brighton prior to Dundalk's epic Europa League run, Towell was an integral part of the team who won the League of Ireland in 2015, which put Dundalk into qualifiers for the Europa and Champions League.
Perth tells a fantastic story of how he tricked managers of other League of Ireland sides into believing Towell was not particularly great, while he went behind their backs and urged Stephen Kenny to snap him up.
“I remember going to watch Bluebell United and Richie Towell was playing and Trevor Croly was there with Colin Hawkins from Rovers watching and Liam Buckley was there from Pats. And at the time I was in a Malahide United tracksuit because I was doing some work with them but I was actually there working for Stephen at the time. I was chatting to the two lads, and bit of a funny story, told Pats and Rovers at the time that Richie wasn’t that good and he wasn’t doing that well in the Leinster Senior League. Came out went to my car and rang Stephen and said just go and do it.
“They came back to have another look we went and signed Richie, and Richie was phenomenal for us in terms of the beginning of that run that we went on. Little things like that go your way, it doesn’t always work out that way, but thankfully the lads Trevor Croly at the time a brilliant coach and Liam Buckley listened to my advice that day and we got the job done. Sometimes it is little bits of luck like that go your way.”
Towell would go onto sign for Salford City after his stint at Brighton, and now finds himself at Shamrock Rovers.
"I told both Pat's and Rover's at the time that Richie wasn't that good" 🤣
Watch the full episode here: https://t.co/Pvc1Otqtkn
Watch every UCL game for free here on the LiveScore app: https://t.co/asGxlTfSUJ. Registered ROI users only. #ad pic.twitter.com/KfRbbXiCkN— Balls.ie (@ballsdotie) May 11, 2022
Vinnie Perth, of course, took over at Dundalk from Stephen Kenny when he left for his post as manager of the Rep. of Ireland U21s, but he stood down from the role in 2021.
You can watch the whole episode here.
See Also: Perth, Massey, And Kilduff Remember A 'Perfect Night' In Tallaght
