Throwback Thursday: Youghal won a derby like no other on way to Munster glory
Youghal's Andrew Curtin celebrates his goal against Ardmore. Picture: Eddie O'Hare
IT'S 10 years since Youghal won the Munster Intermediate Cup Hurling Championship by defeating Ballina 2-13 to 2-10 in Mallow.
That capped off a run that saw the club win a derby like no other as they were paired with Ardmore in the quarter-finals of the Munster championship.
That raised the stakes as the two towns are separated by just a 20-minute drive and the River Blackwater.
The story of the season isn’t in the provincial success, it’s the way Youghal repeatedly delivered that year by holding their nerve in the most crucial moments.
Even in the Cork Premier Intermediate Club Hurling Championship, they needed to respond after losing their opening game to Valley Rovers in Carrigtwohill. The panel did exactly that by edging out Ballincollig 1-12 to 0-13 in the second round, and that kept Youghal in the competition while avoiding the possibility of relegation.
The fourth round paired the club with Cloyne and a fiercely contested east Cork derby finished as a draw. The replay was staged in Midleton and despite Diarmuid O’Sullivan scoring 1-5, Youghal dug in and outscored their Imokilly rivals 2-14 to 2-09 at Clonmult Memorial Park in Midleton.
Tracton were knocked out in the quarter-finals and Inniscarra, who narrowly avoided the relegation play-off by beating Ballincollig in round three, were defeated 4-16 to 1-7 in the semi-finals.
Castlelyons were on the other side of the draw and they were hoping to end a memorable campaign that saw victories over Watergrasshill, Newcestown, and Ballincollig on a high. It wasn’t to be as Youghal held their nerve on the day of the final to win 0-11 to 0-10 at Páirc Uí Rinn.
The East Cork club celebrated their county success with one eye on the opening round of the Munster Intermediate Club Hurling Championship. The derby nature of the Ardmore game put a special twist on the competition, and it attracted hundreds of people to Páirc Uí Rinn.
Youghal prevailed 4-13 to 1-12 and they needed a replay to get the better of Clare champions Whitegate in the Munster semi-finals. The east Cork club took care of business in Fermoy, and that put them through to play Ballina in the Munster final.
R Cunningham; B O’Sullivan, J Grace, K Walsh; M Cronin, C Spillane, Barry Ring; L Desmond, N Roche; D Ring, A Frahill-O’Connor, B Cooper; J O’Mahony, O Dempsey, Brendan Ring.
The club pushed up the pitch once the ball was thrown in and Brendan Ring forced a save from Martin McKeogh and Ollie Dempsey raised a green flag with the loose ball. Ballina hit back with Michael Breen and David Hickey putting the sliotar over the bar, and Youghal steadied themselves through a free that Brendan Ring put converted.
The Tipperary champions kept finding space and they used that to raise enough white flags to take a one-point lead. Youghal responded through a passage of play involving Andrew Curtin and Damien Ring, and this ended with the sliotar hitting the back of the and the East Cork club went up 2-6 to 1-7.
The dismissal of Ballina’s Brian McKeogh did very little to the overall flow of the game, as Domhnall McKeogh goaled not long after for the Tipperary champions and that meant just the bare minimum separated the two clubs. Youghal held their composure in dealing with Ballina’s resurgence and restored a four-point cushion a burst that involved Brendan Ring putting over a brace of frees.
The Tipperary champions were forced to push for a goal and that led to Barry Ring, John Grace, and Richard Cunningham making a string of blocks around the square. The best that Ballina could do was Stephen O’Brien putting over a 65, and the final whistle went seconds later.
Youghal were Munster champions and Brendan Ring summed up the occasion – and season - perfectly in an emotional post-match interview.
"You know we didn’t have the best of starts to the year," he said.
"You can see that here today. We are going about five years now trying to win a county and you can see how we got here. There are no heroes on this team. We’ve had so many disappointments before, losing semi-finals year after year but there is great credit to all the players and what they have put into it.
"The county was our goal, but deep down, we thought we had a team good enough to win the Munster. You are going into the unknown [Munster] but we knew it would take a really good team to beat us. We got the goals at vital stages — we would have been beaten by those goals in the past and today we got them."
There was no All-Ireland to follow, but that did not matter in the winter months as Youghal celebrated their successes, which included a derby win over the town just over the border and that is still being talked about in East Cork.
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