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Youghal hurlers battling to turn tide: Veterans keeping club on right path

EchoLive.ie, 24 Aug

'We’ve a lot of lads 33 plus and then four of the six backs are under

21. It’s just there’s a lost generation in the middle...'

Youghal hurlers battling to turn tide: Veterans keeping club on right

path

Brett Maloney in midfield for Youghal battling against Éire Óg in

2021. Picture: Larry Cummins.

  

  

Stephen Barry

In the moments after their greatest success, Brendan Ring summed up the

resilience that made Youghal the Munster intermediate champions of

2013.

“You know we didn’t have the best of starts to the year,” he said. “We

were beaten in the first round of the Cork championship but we rallied.

You can see that here today how we got here.”

Little did he, or anyone else, think that Youghal’s winless run in the

first round of championship would continue into another decade. When

the Seasiders defeated Cloughduv three weeks ago to jump-start their

Intermediate A campaign, it was their first opening-day victory since

2012. That’s a lot of momentum-crushing first days out.

It didn’t matter much in 2013. But in the years that followed, the club

entered freefall. From 2016 to ‘19, they didn’t win a single match.

After a sole success over Courcey Rovers, the same story repeated from

2021 until the end of ‘23.

They were relegated from senior in 2017 and premier intermediate in

‘22. In 2021, they avoided the relegation play-off on scoring

difference by a single point.

Entering the 2023 relegation final, their record over the previous

eight years read: played 26, won 1, drew 1, lost 24. They emerged from

a nine-goal battle with Douglas’s second team to escape the junior

trapdoor.

Bill Cooper spoke about the potential for that victory to be “a

catalyst for us to really make an impression”. In 2024, they have kept

Cooper’s word.

The most remarkable element of this team is their age profile. Conor

Spillane was centre-back in 2012-'13. This year is his first as

manager. It’s also his first year back playing again.

“Of the team that started the last day, seven of those played in the

2013 final,” he explains. “Our captain was actually injured so we

potentially would’ve had eight.

“I’m 37. Bill Cooper is the same age as me. Nigel (Roche) who started

in midfield is 38. Jonty (Ormond), the full-back, is 40. Brett Moloney,

34. Ciarán O’Mahony, the captain, he’s 34. James O’Mahony, 34.

“So we’ve a lot of lads 33 plus and then four of the six backs are

under 21. It’s just there’s a lost generation in the middle. We’ve

probably three on the panel between 24 and 30.

“Now, we’ve a really good minor team coming but they can’t play with us

this year. The plan is to maintain intermediate status and hopefully

give these lads something to come into next year and a bit of

positivity around the place as well.”

YOUNG GUNS

Jayden Casey, Oisín Walsh and Brian Lynch were all Cork minors last

year. Casey and James Murray were on the U20 panel this year. Despite

not representing Cork, there’s a late bloomer Fionn Hill who they

reckon could prove the best of them.

The older generation keep showing up and will make them earn every

jersey. For Spillane, making up the numbers in training lured him out

of retirement.

“It’s been a difficult year.

Numbers-wise, it’s been hard. We’ve gone out with eight, nine, 10

training for long periods of the year so it has been a grind.

“Now, we’d 26 there tonight so it’s finally coming together but it’s

driven on by the older lads. They absolutely love it. It’s their life.

This is what they live for. They’ve kept the whole thing going.

“I hadn’t played in a few years with injuries and everything else and

it was just that these lads came to myself and Ken (Bulman) at the end

of December and asked if we would get involved.

“Then I was there in the middle doing a bit of training and that’s what

led to me getting back playing again.

“I do a bit of talking on the Thursday night but the day of the game,

once I put on my gear, I’m a player. That’s it.

“It’s in the hands of the lads (Bulman, Stephen Twomey, and Fergal

Keenaghan) after that. I’ve enough problems not to be trying to give

speeches and everything else.”

There were no hard feelings when they whipped him off with a couple of

minutes to go last weekend: “My body is held together with tape and I

think the tape fell off at that stage!”

It’s Mayfield on Saturday, albeit with top-scorer Devon O’Donoghue

unavailable. Mission number one is to concrete their status. If they

win, they could reach knockout hurling again. But history doesn’t

permit them any false illusions.

“If we can just keep everything ticking over and keep our intermediate

status,” concludes Spillane, “you’d hope in five or 10 years that

there’ll be enough coming through that we can start pushing up the

grades again.”