Towards the end of the 1940's, the Dublin diocese recognised that forcing residents from what was now Navan Road parish to attend mass across the Phoenix Park in Chapelizod was an unnecessary hardship.

Permission was given to establish a new parish and, in the absence of their own parish church, parishioners attended mass in St.Vincents. A plot of ground on the main Dublin-Navan road was sold to the Dublin diocese by the Dominican sisters at a cost of £500 for the purposes of building a new Church and school.

Until the work was completed, the lands were rented to local football teams. The church was ultimately completed in 1952 at an estimated cost of £65,000.

Football In The Community

The development of the church and school buildings attracted more families to the parish. By the early 1960s, new housing developments stretched the parish from Skreen Road to Darling Estate. With the introduction of so many new families, it was inevitable that sporting facilities would follow. By the end of the 1960s, Kinvara Boys and Ashtown United FC were offering underage and senior football. Fourteen years later, there were four Clubs offering soccer to the Navan Road community, with Villa Park Rangers and Ards FC also in operation.

Mergers

In 1987, Ashtown United and Villa Park Rangers decided to merge. One of their first activities as a single club was to invest £17,000 on 12 acres of land behind Dolly Heffernan's Pub in Mooretown, north west of Blanchardstown. Little did they know the impact that this would have. In their first season, the newly formed Ashtown Villa finished third in division one of the AUL, before joining the newly formed Leinster Senior League. The early 1990s was a successful time for the new club with a number of forays into the FAI cup, including, famously, a run to the quarter finals in 1991, beating Dundalk and Derry City on the way. The following decade saw the club become one of the most successful in amateur soccer, with wins in the Metropolitian Cup, Charlie Cahill Cup and Intermediate Cup all coming their way.

A First Class Academy

By the same time, Kinvara Boys, who had developed a reputation as one of the primary academies in the city for underage football, had completed a new clubhouse at their grounds at Martin Savage Park . A number of junior and senior Irish internationals went through their ranks including former Aston Villa regular and ex Bohemians manager Gareth Farrelly and Robbie Best (Bohemians Captain and League of Ireland Representative side) and Donal Doherty (Fulham). The senior side rose to be one of the most powerful sides in the Athletic Union League (AUL) achieving national success by winning the FAI junior cup in 1992-93. Nine of the starting team had come through the schoolboy teams at the club.

A Hotbed of Soccer

Navan Road in the 1990s proved to be a real hotbed of soccer, with Ards FC bringing home the prestigious Polikoff Cup in 1999 along with reaching the quarter final of the Leinster Senior cup only to be beaten by a full strength Bohemians side. Ards F.C also contributed on the international front with two of their players continuously selected as part of the Junior International set up. Ards continued to rise through the ranks of Junior Football and announced their arrival at intermediate level in 2000 by winning the Finches Gilligan cup. In 2002, Kinvara Boys and Ards merged to form Kinvara Ards - the underage teams playing their games in Martin Savage Park while the senior teams operated out of the Belvedere facilities on the Navan Road.

A longer term vision

In 2002 both Ashtown Villa and Kinvara Ards produced long term development plans. Despite the fact that both clubs were operating independently of each other, their objectives were remarkably similar:

• to give ever child and member the necessary support to realise their full potential,
• to provide a recreational and competitive club where young people and adults can enjoy sport,
• and by raising the standard of football and coaching played in order to attract and retain players

Moving Home

Around the same time, Ashtown Villa agreed a land swap for their property in Mooretown: the deal allowed them to return to the parish, with 10 acres of land in Scribblestown, near Ashtown Railway Station. Sufficient funds were generated to undertake a development programme which will see, when completed, two full size and one artificial pitch in use in Scribblestown. A clubhouse will also be built. The move "home" also prompted discussions within the club about the development of an underage set up: however, it was agreed that, with Kinvara Ards already providing excellent opportunities, there was no benefit in competing. Discussions followed and, over a twelve month period from early 2005, agreement was reached between the two clubs to consolidate their operations.

AND AS THEY SAY "THE REST IS HISTORY"