Blow for Beara football to withdraw from Cork Premier Senior football grade

TWELVE months on from the 25th anniversary of their last Cork SFC title, the Beara division will not compete in this year’s Bon Secours Cork PSFC Divisional/Colleges section competition.

News that Beara had pulled their senior football team from this year’s Divisional/Colleges section came as a disappointing blow earlier in the week.

Avondhu were listed as the rural division’s opponents in the opening round until Beara informed the county board that they would be unable to field a team for the June 8 championship fixture.

As a result, Avondhu have automatically progressed to the semi-finals of the Divisional/Colleges section. Imokilly's win over Muskerry put them through, with the Mid Cork side now getting a second chance against Duhallow.

Carbery and UCC are seeded from last year and await the qualifiers from this year’s Divisional/Colleges round-robin section in the knockout stages.

SETBACK

Beara’s absence represents a massive setback considering how well the division’s representatives were making progress both on and off the field in recent times.

Last March, Beara Community School capped off a remarkable 12 months by winning the 2022 Masita GAA All-Ireland PPS Senior D football championship for the first time in 27 years.

The rural school claimed their first All-Ireland trophy since 1995 on the back of a successful Munster championship and semi-final victory over Ulster champions Ballybay Community College from Monaghan.

Overcoming Our Lady’s College Belmullet 3-11 to 3-9 in the All-Ireland decider, Beara deservedly lifted the Br Edmund Ignatius Rice Cup.

On top of that, Beara withstood a strong Castlehaven fightback to win the 2022 Bon Secours U19 Premier 1 football championship title.

A 2-10 to 2-7 victory over the Haven’ was attained thanks to Fintan Fenner’s 1-5 and Lee Kelly’s 1-1.

Those Beara Community School and the U19 successes only served to highlight the quality of young players emerging from Adrigole, Bere Island, Castletownbere, Garnish, Glengarriff and Urhan.

Some of those young players would also make their mark at adult level.

Urhan missed out on a Cork JAFC county final appearance following a narrow 4-point semi-final defeat to Kilmurry. Boherbue edged Adrigole by a point in the Cork IAFC quarter-finals. Garnish lost out to Diarmuid O’Mathunas in the penultimate round of the Cork JBFC.

PROGRESS

Everywhere you looked, Beara’s representatives were making inroads in their respective championships.

It was the same story much earlier in the season when Beara’s appointment of Kerry native Andrew Fitzgerald as their divisional football had an immediate and positive effect.

Recovering from a 3-10 to 0-14 preliminary round defeat to Avondhu, Beara got their Divisional/Colleges section campaign back on track in their next outing.

A rousing 0-16 to 0-10 defeat of Muskerry owed much to Sean Terry O’Sullivan’s individual haul of 0-6.

Buoyed by that excellent performance, Beara pushed Carbery — who would go on to defeat Duhallow and qualify for the Cork PSFC quarter-finals — all the way before succumbing to a 1-12 to 0-8 loss.

Cork senior Ruairí Deane did most of the damage, scoring 1-7 on an evening Beara’s hopes were extinguished by a slicker, more clinical opponent.

Despite the defeat, Beara manager Andrew Fitzgerald was proud of the effort put in by a panel eager to make their mark in the county’s top tier.

“I suppose the big thing for Beara, this year, is that we have put a foundation in place for the players,” Fitzgerald said.

Beara footballers now know that there is a platform there for them to play at the highest level.

“Nights like tonight, a beautiful evening and big crowd, what player in Beara wouldn’t want to play at this level is the question?

“I think players realise what an opportunity they have now.”

So, it is against the backdrop of such a positive 2022 that Beara’s omission from the upcoming Bon Secours Cork Divisional/Colleges championship is all the more saddening.

The geographical challenge of bringing player clubs players together to represent Beara has always been present.

Yet, with the right organisation and no shortage of self-belief, the rural division showed what it was capable of at schools, U19 and senior level over the year.

A Cork senior football championship will be all the poorer for Beara’s omission in 2023.

Let’s hope it is just a temporary absence because a division with such a rich history (six Cork senior county football titles between 1932 and 1997) and deep-rooted love of the GAA belongs in the county’s football premier competitions.