Blarney and Newcestown gear for up differing challenges as a new championship year commences

As if we needed reminding, the All-Ireland hurling final showed us how the emotions of victory and defeat diverge exponentially.

A one-point game was boiled down to all the great things Clare did and all the things Cork (or the officials did wrong), with the Banner dominating team of the year selections. Of course, had Cork managed to sneak a win, the opposite would be the case.

The one consolation for Cork is that they will start 2025 from exactly the same place as Clare, and everybody else. In county championships below the top grade, the fine margins can have even greater repercussions.

Last October, Blarney led for most of the Co-op SuperStores Cork SAHC final only for Newcestown to make a late surge and take the lead. Blarney got themselves a draw but Newcestown prevailed in the replay by a point.

Now, the West Cork club are gearing up for the Premier SHC while their opponents must begin at base camp one if they are to match, and better, their efforts of 2023.

For Blarney, who face Carrigtwohill this evening, there is the welcome return of two key players who suffered injury during last year’s campaign.

“Alan McEvoy and Denis McSweeney, who were injured last year in the Cloyne game, both of them are back,” says manager Michael Barrett.

“We haven’t got a lot of game-time out of them yet but their recovery has gone well and everything is going okay.

“Bar the normal hamstring issues that seem to be common across the board with every team, we’ve nothing major.”

Barrett’s son Shane, along with Mark Coleman and Pádraig Power, were part of the Cork squad that went so close to winning the All-Ireland. That is of course a double-edged sword for a club.

“You’d have liked a bit more time with them,” Barrett says.

“We finished on the October weekend last year and the lads were back in with the inter-county scene two weeks later.

“We haven’t seen them since – that’s the negative but the positive is that it gives us the chance to go through the league and develop others.

“With those types of players unavailable, winning the league is always going to be a challenge – winning league games can be a challenge! – but it gives us an opportunity to blood younger fellas, which is what we’ve been using it for.

“It’s fantastic that we have inter-county players – it’s a great boost for the lads personally and for the club and everyone associated with it. But the negatives are, from a management point of view, for a club team with those players unavailable you have to completely re-strategise.”

Newcestown are in Premier SHC action against Fr O’Neills tomorrow.

A small playing pool is one of their challenges, not to mention operating in Division 3 of the RedFM Hurling League. Nevertheless, manager Charlie Wilson is looking forward to operating at the top tier.

“The bottom line really is that league and championship are two different animals completely,” he says, “and we’re a different animal once we reach championship.

“We have to be competitive and we will be competitive. Okay, we mightn’t be world-beaters but we’ll be hard to beat, one way or the other.

“We’ll always compete and, as the man says, we’ll do our parish proud, one way or the other. We’ll stick to our guns and we’ll battle.

“We proved last year that we have a bit of hurling, there’s no two ways about that, and we have a lot of character. Character is what it’s all about come championship.”