Former Galway footballer Billy Joyce has died at the age of 75.
A native of Killererin, Joyce enjoyed a lengthy inter-county career with Galway, spanning from 1969 until his retirement at the end of the 1984 championship.
During his career, Galway racked up eight Connacht titles, dominating the province in the early 1970s and early 1980s and reaching four All-Ireland finals.
Usually deployed at midfield, Joyce was an ever-present in the Galway side that reached three All-Ireland deciders in 1971, 1973 and 1974, however the westerners fell short on each occasion, losing to Offaly, Cork and then Dublin.
Joyce, by then in his mid-30s, was still part of the Galway squad that next reached the All-Ireland final in 1983, being introduced as a late sub in that year’s infamous decider.
Before that, the Killererin star did claim national honours in Croke Park, as part of the Galway side that won the National League in 1980-81, the county’s last ever Division 1 league title.
He subsequently managed the Galway senior footballers for three seasons in the late 1980s, guiding them to a Connacht title victory in 1987.
Joyce later managed his club Killererin for several stints, leading them to the Galway SFC title in 2004, adding to the two he won as a player in 1976 and 1978. He had been strikingly late to the game, telling the Irish Examiner in 2023 that he only first played for the club as a 19-year-old in 1968, a year before his senior debut for Galway.
He is an uncle of current Galway manager Pádraic Joyce and his brother Tommy, both of whom won All-Ireland titles in 1998 and 2001.
His son Nicky was a fixture in the Galway attack between 2003 and 2012, winning three Connacht titles.
