Coláiste Choilm nurture strong rugby culture, from C grade to brink of Munster Senior Cup

Coláiste Choilm fell agonisingly short of earning a Munster Schools Senior Cup debut but head coach Conor Owens is certain his team have paved the way for a future breakthrough.

The Ballincollig school built up a 20-7 half-time lead over Hamilton High School in their qualification final with tries from the impressive Charlie Murphy and talented youngster Sam Moore.

But turning to face a gale at Virgin Media Park, they were pipped in the penultimate minute by Hammies for a 22-20 defeat.

“There’s definitely a culture of rugby in Coláiste Choilm now,” reflected Owens.

We’re moreso known for our football and our hurling but rugby is definitely making its presence known in our school.

“In a way, our Senior team are inspiring the Junior team that were here to support them.

“OK, they haven’t got to the Senior Cup knockout stage but I’m sure in years to come, they’ve paved the way for future teams to make it that far in our school.

“This is the first time that we’ve ever played in the Senior Cup qualifiers final. It’s a testament to the work that the clubs are doing really.

“We pull from five clubs in Coláiste Choilm with our Senior team; Dolphin, Con, Muskerry, Highfield, and mainly Ballincollig.

We just complement the work that’s being done at club level but there’s a culture now.

“You can see in the stands a lot of past pupils coming back and supporting the team, which is great.” 

GREAT STRIDES

They have progressed from a C school playing 10-a-side rugby to one of the strongest B schools, winning the Mungret Cup in 2019 and ’24.

“Our school has developed from humble beginnings but our lads are sickened so there’s a great expectation there now,” added Owens.

“Our sixth years, in particular, I feel sorry for because they’ve put so much into the jersey since first year.

“It’d have been the icing on the cake for them to get our school into Senior Cup but look, it wasn’t meant to be.

“We also have a couple of transition-year lads and fifth-year students on the team. Next year is another year and we’ll kick on from there.” 

The game itself was dictated by the gale-force wind blowing towards the Dolphin End.

“Our strength is in our ball carrying. Sam Moore is a huge ball carrier for us and we’ve big lads in the centre,” said Owens.

“That was our game plan: Keep it simple, up-the-jumper rugby. Our 15 Adam Dodd has a great boot and we used that.

“It worked for us in the first half with the wind behind us but we never got any continuity in the second half: A lot of errors, our penalty count was too high, we’d two yellow cards.

“We let Hammies into the game through our errors but the lads gave 100%. The effort was huge. There’ll be a lot of learning and hurt from this.

“Hammies showed great character to stick in the race. They waited their time and they took their chances."