Kilmacabea boss hopes experience will help his side in county final against Donoughmore

Kilmacabea manager Donie O’Donovan feels the experience of the last few years will help his team in Sunday’s McCarthy Insurance Group County JAFC final.

The West Cork side take on Donoughmore at SuperValu Páirc Uí Chaoimh with a start time of 3.30pm.

Kilmacabea have been there or thereabouts over the last number of years. They lost the county final in 2018 to Dromtarriffe.

Last season, the Leap-based outfit lost to the eventual winners Inniscarra at the county semi-final juncture.

“You would like to think the journey we have been on over the last few years will help us,” O’Donovan says.

“We were here seven years ago and people might think it’s more or less the same team, but the team has changed a lot. As a club, it was our first county final at this grade. We did win the county at Junior B level in 1994, which is still being spoken about.

“It was a big deal back then. It was our first and only county success to date. It would have been great to have got over Dromtarriffe in 2018, but they just finished better heading down the home stretch. It was a tough loss.

“We thought we might not ever get that chance again to be honest, but here we are, back again in the final.

“As you know, it’s really hard to get out of Carbery. You would hope the close battles, experience and so on will stand to us.” 

Kilmacabea come into the decider on the back of a tough semi-final last Saturday. They won by three points against Charleville. The quick turnaround is down to the semi-finals being pushed out a week due to the weather.

It’s the same for Kilmacabea’s opposition, Donoughmore, who hammered Nemo Rangers’ third team also last Saturday.

“There was a great buzz when we got to the county final in 2018, there was fierce excitement,” the Kilmacabea boss said.

“Now, the turnaround is so short you don’t get a chance to get ahead of yourself, which could be a good thing.

“Ideally, you would like two weeks, but everyone is in the same boat. We would be a lot more disappointed if we lost to Charleville and wouldn’t have this headache of the quick turnaround.” 

The West Cork outfit were one of the fancied teams for county glory at the start of the campaign. They haven’t largely put a foot wrong this year.

They have just one more big step to go if they want to join the Premier Junior ranks for the 2026 season.

“This is my second year in charge of the team, up to that, I was playing. I know what’s inside in this dressing room. We lost the Carbery final in 2023 to Barryroe and people probably thought that was the end of us.

“That hurt that night in Dunmanway helped us get back to where we are today. It has been a long road since then.

“We have been playing in Division 7 of the Cork County League and that has been a big help to us too. When you are playing in that, you aren’t really thinking about the championship as you are playing different teams.” 

It would mean the world to Kilmacabea if they were to get over the line on Sunday. The expectation is that it will be a very close game.

“I will be honest, I don’t know a lot about Donoughmore in terms of their team. Aghinagh would have been tipped to come out of Muskerry and Donoughmore beat them after a replay. That will tell you what kind of team that they are.

“Also, the last three county winners have come from Muskerry, Kilmurry, Canovee and Inniscarra. We know that this will be a very difficult game for us.

“As a club, Donoughmore are coming. They will climb the ranks in the coming years, but hopefully it won’t be at our expense.

“We will give it everything and hopefully it will be enough.”