Cork GAA Jersey Wars: Kiskeam v Éire Óg

WE want to know what your favourite GAA geansaí is.

From here until the end of August, your votes will decide the best design in our Cork GAA Jersey Wars competition.

Our resident jersey expert Denis Hurley compiled a list of 32 clubs, based on those involved in the senior tiers and a selection of wild cards. We put them in alphabetical order and paired them up and we're now down to the last 16 stage. 

Full details of the competition are here.

Voting will run from 8am each day for 24 hours on the link below:

KISKEAM

IT'S perhaps unsurprising that the New Zealand rugby team should provide the inspiration for Kiskeam’s colours, though for the first 20 years of the club’s existence, they lined out in a blue jersey with yellow sash.

Founded in the mid-1940s, Kiskeam did win the Duhallow novice title in 1947 but otherwise success was hard to come by for the club situated close to the Cork/Kerry border.

Having reached the 1960 Duhallow junior final, Kiskeam enjoyed an eight-point lead over Castlemagner at one stage but lost out and then, following a heavy defeat to the same opposition in 1963, one Kiskeam player walking off the field suggested that the blue and yellow jerseys should be burned.

Whether or not the garments met such a fiery fate is unknown, but what is certain is they were not seen again as the colours were replaced. Prior to the start of the 1964 season, a change was afoot, as then-club treasurer and current president John P Murphy told The Echo’s John Tarrant in 2020.

“It came up at a club meeting,” he said.

We needed to turn matters around, somebody spoke of the All Black rugby success in their familiar colours. Though there wasn’t too much money in the kitty, it was proposed and accepted to opt for a black jersey.”

The transformation in fortunes was immediate as the club won the Duhallow title for the first time in 1964 and went all the way to county glory. A period competing at intermediate level followed and, while they did drop back to junior, the 1990s saw them regularly challenging for divisional honours.

In 1994, 1996, 1997, 1999 and 2000, they won the Duhallow junior football title, reaching the county final in 1994, 1997 and 2000, while there were divisional final losses in 1991 and 1995. Eventually, they went all the way in the county in 2002 – reaching the Munster club final – and when the intermediate grade was split in two for 2006, Kiskeam were placed in the new premier intermediate championship.

Ten years later was to prove to be a memorable one, as the club achieved a place in the senior championship with victory in the PIFC. After a first-round defeat to Na Piarsaigh, Kiskeam regrouped with wins over Castletownbere and Mallow before turning the tables on Piarsaigh at the quarter-final stage.

Another win, against Béal Átha’n Ghaorthaidh, set up a final clash with Fermoy, who also wear an all-black kit, trimmed in amber. The North Cork side wore red and white for the final while Kiskeam donned a reversal of their usual jerseys, white with black accents, but it didn’t affect them unduly as they triumphed by 2-12 to 0-14 in Páirc Uí Rinn.

Wins over Aghada and Carbery were highlights of the first year up while there was a memorable victory over Mallow in 2019, but the end of that year saw a restructuring with Kiskeam placed in the new Senior A grade, from where they will look to progress in 2021. Public house The Harp & Shamrock provide shirt sponsorship.

ÉIRE ÓG

A club by the name of Bride Valley competed against Inniscarra in a Mid-Cork championship game in Coachford in April 1891, meaning that codified Gaelic games have been present in the parish of Ovens for 120 years.

Divisional boards were established in the mid-1920s and Bride Valley, who wore blue jerseys with red cuffs, were the winners of the first two Muskerry junior titles in 1925 and 1926 before combining with Cloughduv to form Éire Óg, an outfit capable of competing at senior level.

In 1928, the new entity defeated Mallow in the county senior hurling final at the Athletic Grounds, but eight years later the merger was reversed. However, the team composed of the former Bride Valley players kept the Éire Óg name, now wearing mainly red jerseys with blue accents.

Those colours remained until the mid-1950s when the red and yellow we know today came to be the club’s identity, albeit in fortuitous circumstances. While the set of jerseys the club possessed falling into disrepair, funds to purchase a new set were low but Kilcrea native Denis Desmond – grand-uncle of current hurling goalkeeper Dylan Desmond – was a draper in Mallow and the local club had yet to collect or pay for the red and yellow set that they had ordered. Desmond offered the jerseys to his home club at half-price and so the tradition was born.

County junior hurling titles followed in 1962 and 1977, with intermediate glory coming just two years later, against Mallow – both clubs wore their first-choice kits, with Éire Óg’s yellow band around the chest providing differentiation.

They played at senior for a few years before regrading at the end of 1982 and, while the intermediate title was claimed again in 1985, on that occasion they opted not to move up to senior level.

In the interim, football has become stronger in the club, with the Muskerry and county junior wins of 2008 setting the train in motion. The intermediate championship followed in 2014, having lost the final in 2012, and then they came out on top in the premier intermediate grade in 2019.

Normally, such a win would have meant promotion to the top tier but, as the championships were restructured ahead of 2020, Éire Óg would compete in the senior A grade. Put in the same group with Mallow, Éire Óg wore yellow when the clubs met – a white change jersey had been used earlier in the 2010s – and while Mallow won that, Éire Óg still qualified for the knockout stage and the two clubs progressed to the final.

Due to Covid-19, there would be a long wait for that to be played, with the match eventually taking place in June 2021. On this occasion, Mallow changed to yellow and the Éire Óg’s first-choice kit served them well as they made it to the premier senior grade.

The club’s jersey sponsors are Blackwater Motors Volkswagen.