Belfast bookmaker Barney Eastwood has paid out £30,000 (almost €45,000) on Owen Mulligan's boots worn by the Tyrone star in an epic All-Ireland senior football championship quarter-final against Dublin in 2005. The boots in which Mulligan scored a great goal in that match went under the hammer at a fund-raising function at the weekend, run by Mulligan's club, Cookstown Fr Rocks.
And Eastwood, himself a former Cookstown and Tyrone minor star, topped the bidding.
The goal that helped Tyrone fight back and force a replay with Dublin at Croke Park may never be bettered in terms of its individual brilliance and sheer drama.
Fr Rocks chairman Adrian Gilmore paid tribute to the generosity of Mulligan, who donated the boots to the club. "I have no doubt we will have to wait a very long time to see the likes of that wonder goal in Croke Park again and we are delighted Owen has made this wonderful gesture," said Gilmore.
Mulligan's strike helped Tyrone earn a draw in a thriller, and he hit the net again as the county scored a comfortable replay win on their way to a second All-Ireland title in three years.
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