Tadhgo Crowley

Timothy J. Crowley (24 April 1921 – 3 December 1963), also known as Tadhgo Crowley, was an Irish Gaelic football player and referee. Throughout his 18-year club career, he played for his hometown club Clonakilty, winning seven County Championship titles during a golden age for the club; he also played hurling for 'Clon', and had much success in the West Cork Championship. At inter-county level, he captained the Cork county team to the 1945 All-Ireland Championship title; he had earlier won an All-Ireland title as a member of the Cork minor hurling team in 1939. As well as being a successful captain for club and county, Crowley led Munster to win two Railway Cups: in 1946 as captain, and in 1948. Towards the end of his career, he served as a referee at club and inter-county levels.

Crowley is widely considered one of the best players of his generation, and among the greatest of all time, as well as being regarded by many in the sport as Cork's greatest ever centre-back.^[1] A Cork Examiner obituary stated that his "high fetching, fearlessness, long kicking and clever anticipation put him in a class apart." Crowley is the youngest of Cork's seven All-Ireland-winning captains and was the first of those to accept the Sam Maguire Cup. He was posthumously named in the centre-back position on the Cork Team of the Century in 1984 and the Cork Team of the Millennium in 2000.