“Sorry lads, it just wasn’t good enough.”

If someone was to ask me to sum up Mark Farren, my mind drifts back to the car park in Gortakeegan after Derry crashed out of the League Cup to Monaghan United. Gavin Dykes was the manager and Derry had put in a fairly abject performance including two red cards. We had filled a bus from Belfast and travelled down for the game and the spirits were pretty low.

Lads were just finishing up in the bar at the ground and we were waiting on the last few stragglers to get on the road. Mark appeared out of the building and wandered over to us. For a chat. Those of us who had travelled were more in shock at what we had seen and the low ebb around the club. Mark saw us, felt that it was the right thing to do to come and have a word. And that was the testament of the man, a man who prided himself on what was the right thing to do.

I’m traveling with work at the moment so learned the news overnight of Mark’s sad and untimely passing. A broken sleep saw me lift my phone and find numerous texts and tweets. I’ll admit that I got less sleep afterwards, as I lay in a foreign bed thinking of the many games and goals that Mark was involved in over the years.

Mark was less than a year older than myself and therefore I truly did “grow up” watching him. From that explosive hat trick against Limerick which saw his appearance on the stage, to the record breaking final goal, I’ve been there for the vast majority of those. It co-incides with a lot of my involvement with the club, be in involvement with this site, covering the games on “Match Night Live” or involvement in other activities around the club. So Mark was a central figure in my time around the club and we were all the better for it.

On the field his record speaks for itself. Goals, goals and more goals. Goals to keep us up. Goals to win us Cups. Late winners. Early winners. He had them all and after years of City fans crying out for a striker than could score 15 a season, Farren was that man. Signed under Gavin Dykes, he blossomed under Stephen Kenny and was feared by defences across the land. I can remember a night that Colin Green and I were covering the game back on the radio, when Jason McGuiness seemed to be on a one man mission to see if it was possible to perform an amputation using only late tackles from behind. As McGuinness performed a variety of fouls, Colin was getting increasingly incensed. As were some of the enforcers on the Derry side. Not Farren, he took the hit, got up and went again.

In terms of the goals that he scored the years, everyone will have their own favourites. It may be the Cup final goal, the hat trick v Linfield, the “perfect hat trick” against Drogheda, the late winner against Waterford in 2006, the promotion winner in Monaghan. The struggle of trying your pick of a favourite goal is that for a man with over a hundred goals, there is an awful lot to choose from. Some many goals, so many times I uttered the words “And Farren runs onto it” before describing the goal that would invariably follow.

Close your eyes for a moment and let your mind drift back to glory days of 2005/06. Farren scored 18 goals that season and not a penalty amongst them. A flighted through ball splitting the defence as Farren rushes onto it and rolls it past the keeper. How many times was that scene repeated over the years in grounds, up and down the country?

Mark was also a pleasure to deal with off the field as well. Whether it was stuff for the club website, the programme or Drive 105, Mark was always generous with his time. He was never cocky or arrogant, he was a humble man who didn’t exude bravado. He knew what he could do and he let his play do his talking for him. As Stephen Kenny once said “He is one of the most decent and unassuming human beings that you could ever meet”. That’s not to say that he didn’t have a twinkle in his eye and wasn’t capable of telling us a story or two about his team mate if we were looking for material for a future podcast episode or the like.

As part of the fundraising campaign Glenavon organised a fundraising game for Mark, a player that had only turned out for them for a couple of years. A number of us travelled up from Dublin for that game and to hear the warmth and affection with which the Glenavon players and support spoke about Mark showed once again his character as a man. The game in the Brandywell and at Mourneview were emotional occasions to see how a young man had been reduced to a shadow of the physical specimen he had been at the peak of his powers. Again, due to the close age range I know this really had an impact on me and was very conscious of this.

Mark fought the illness in the same way that he played full of energy and committing himself wholeheartedly to it. He faced up to it and tried every avenue that was available to him. The footage in October gave some hope that the treatment had proved a success, but ultimately the news today was that it hasn’t been enough. The severity of Mark’s condition was never underestimated but I’m not shy to admit that the news today still shocked me. I can only extend my sincere sympathies to Terri and to the extended families on both sides. We got to see the player for 90 minutes every week. Their loss will be immeasurably larger than ours.

I have many other memories of Mark Farren’s career with Derry and his all too short life on this earth. I count myself to have been lucky to have seen Mark in full flight, terrorising defences and scoring for fun. Every supporter will have their own memories and should treasure them. So when people ask me in the future about Mark Farren, my mind will drift not first to a rippling goal or a celebration. It will be to a rapidly emptying car park in Monaghan when a throughly decent fella came over for a chat, when he easily could not have bothered. A talented player and an absolute gentleman.

Rest in peace in Mark

Kevin McDaid

Mark Farren: A personal appreciation was last modified: by