West Cork footballer enjoys dream period with Goleen and UL

It has been a memorable eight months or so for West Cork native Michael O’Reilly.

The 23-year-old footballer played a key role in helping his beloved Goleen win the McCarthy Insurance Group Confined JBFC last July before winning a Munster crown with UL last month.

It was Goleen’s second-ever county title having won their first at Junior C level in 2016.

O’Reilly has been an important player on the team over the last few years and his development would have been aided by playing college football with UL. He was on the Limerick-based college’s Junior side, the third team that won provincial glory.

“It’s always nice to win a Munster trophy, they don’t come around too often,” he said.

“With the way it works, we actually played the All-Ireland series first, which is strange enough, where we lost to DCU, but due to our run, we qualified for the Munster final on the back of our ranking, so it was nice after all the effort that was put in.

“In UL, you have two Junior teams given the numbers we have. I was lucky enough to be part of the first team and we got the better of our second team in the final. It was amazing with how it turned out that we actually met in the Munster final. Fellas that you have trained with for months, so that was different in a way. There was great excitement in the build-up.

“The standard was actually high enough. You had lads that would have played underage at inter-county level and they might be coming back from injury or whatever and they drop down then to Junior with the college. It was a nice thing to win.” 

Goleen emerged from the shadows last summer when they finally claimed championship silverware at Junior B level after so much heartbreak. This year, they will be playing in the Bandon Co-Op Carbery JAFC. A new adventure for a club who has no underage. A small parish with tight numbers.

“It has been an incredible few years for the club,” O’Reilly says.

“The last two years has been the most enjoyable football I have ever played in my life anyway. The buy-in we have had has been unreal, every night at training we would have around 25 lads togged out.

“I can remember when I started off playing for Goleen and we would only have about 13 players some nights at training. Last year was special, winning in Páirc Uí Rinn. We went back training on the second of January last year. We were running down in Barley Cove every Sunday morning from February to April. It was a hard task but it was all worth it. We have never been so close as a team and it was a great bonding session.” 

Goleen won’t be fancied by many outside of their bubble to make an impression in the Bandon Co-Op Carbery JAFC this season. They are with St Mary’s, Carbery Rangers' second team and St Colum’s.

“The first aim is to be competitive,” the forward states.

“We have a young enough squad at the moment. I am 23 years of age and there are five or six others my age starting on the team plus a few around the 20 mark and we have a 19-year-old and an 18-year-old on the panel.

“The average age of our team is around 25. As a club, we want to push on and do well in the Junior A grade. We are without Shane O’Neill and Donal McGrath, both were part of the management for the last few years, they have moved on. Donal was the best trainer I ever had. We wouldn’t be where we are today if it wasn’t for both of them.

“As a group of players, we said recently that we don’t just want to come up now and make up the numbers. With the support we have, who knows what might happen."