Tribe have been a major obstacle to Cork underage hurling success

GALWAY'S record in the minor hurling championship is incredible. 

The Tribe are in their 17th final in 23 seasons and they've won 11 of those. They're going for five in a row this weekend. It's a stunning return, especially when you compare it to Cork's. 

The Rebels did win the minor All-Ireland in 1998 and from that team, Ronan Curran and Niall McCarthy progressed to the senior ranks to backbone Cork's golden era in the mid-noughties. McCarthy is of course currently a minor selector alongside Noel Furlong, who played minor in both codes in the late '90s.

However, from 1999 to 2020, Cork's minor haul was just one All-Ireland, and that was in 2001. John Gardiner, Setanta Ó hAilpín, Kieran 'Fraggie' Murphy and Tomás O'Leary, albeit as an international rugby scrum-half, are the best-known players from that crop, while they lifted the All-Ireland through the backdoor, having lost to Tipp in Munster.

From 2002 to 2008, Cork appeared to be in rude health at minor. They collected four provincial titles from seven but Galway regularly knocked them out in All-Ireland semi-finals and when they did beat them, in a 2007 quarter-final, to reach the All-Ireland, Tipp proved too strong.

The 2008 Cork minor panel included slick hurlers like William Egan, Jamie Coughlan and Paul Haughney, but Aidan Walsh, Mark Collins and Ciarán Sheehan from that panel would go on to have greater success as footballers.

The period from 2008 onwards saw a dramatic dip for Cork minor hurling. The county didn't even make a Munster final from there until 2017. 

When they roared to the title that summer, with Brian Turnbull and Evan Sheehan the lethal forwards feeding off target-man and Rob Downey, Daire Connery, Seán O'Leary Hayes, Ger Millerick and Ger Collins, among the standouts further back, Galway were waiting.

Downey had a goal disallowed controversially while the young Tribesmen fed off the crowd pouring in for the senior game with Waterford. In a game of tight margins, they were key factors in the loss on Jones Road.

There was a one-off U17 All-Ireland in 2017, covering the change of the grade from U18 down from 2018, which Cork secured via a semi-final win over Galway and then a victory over Dublin. 

The likes of Connery, the Roche twins, Colin O'Brien and Tommy O'Connell were among the hurlers to star for Cork's U20s in their All-Ireland last month.

Interestingly, Shane Barrett, then just U16, came on for the Cork U17s in their semi-final against the Tribe.

The most hyped Cork minor side of the 2010s was the 2015 team, spearheaded by Shane Kingston to a resounding defeat of Limerick in the provincial opener. 

Unfortunately, Kingston was injured in a challenge match after and a flaw in the provincial system meant Denis Ring's charges had to travel to Limerick for a knockout semi-final repeat.

The young Rebels, with Darragh Fitzgibbon and Mark Coleman on song, still should have won, but Peter Casey, Kyle Hayes, Seamus Flanagan and co saw them off at the Gaelic Grounds. It was a galling loss.

As heavily criticised as Ring and his management team were at the time, they succeeded in the primary job of bringing senior hurlers through. 

Kingston, Fitzgibbon, Coleman, Robbie O'Flynn, Conor Cahalane, Tim O'Mahony, Billy Hennessy, Niall O'Leary and Deccie Dalton have all featured this summer for the seniors on their way to the All-Ireland.

Ring and his selectors moved on to the U20/U21 set-up in 2018 and '19 and again, guided Cork to All-Ireland finals. Losing them was a bitter pill to swallow but the experience steeled what is now the nucleus of the elite team.

We'll have to wait and see who makes the cut at the top level from the current crew. There's a long road to travel from U17 to senior, whether they beat Galway or not this weekend.

In Noel Furlong and his management team, they're in safe hands.