All-Ireland Club JHC: Joe Ryan proud of mettle shown by Kilbrittain in claiming victory

While the biggest challenge and opportunity awaits in the early days of 2026, Kilbrittain rounded off the calendar year with an eighth win from eight championship games.

Davidstown-Courtnacuddy were seen off in Saturday’s All-Ireland Club JHC semi-final but the 2-15 to 1-16 scoreline was a hard-earned victory for the West Cork side.

When Lucas Fitzpatrick crashed home a superb goal for Davidstown-Courtnacuddy with normal time almost up, it reduced Kilbrittain’s lead from four points to one. We have seen more than a few examples of such situations to almost expect the trailing side to be awarded a free as a matter of course.

However, Kilbrittain made sure not to allow any unforced error and the Wexford and Leinster champions were unable to fashion an equalising attempt before Mark Hickey’s 12th point of the day afforded some more breathing space.

“As soon as they got the goal, the fourth official very helpfully told us that there was five minutes left,” said Kilbrittain manager Joe Ryan, “so I thought we'd be under pressure.

“We had spoken about it at half-time about learning – I thought they were excellent in the second half, there was no backchat, there was no silly frees given away.

“You saw the conditions, it was really, really hard - I'd say it was an absolutely absorbing game to watch.”

In their previous outing three weeks earlier, the 2-17 to 0-9 Munster final win over Waterford’s Kilrossanty, Kilbrittain had clicked to devastating effect. The tough conditions were always likely to make a repeat difficult – the tally of four wides in the whole of the provincial decider was matched inside ten minutes here – but coming through such a battle displayed a different side of the Kilbrittain game.

“We still scored 2-15, which is very good scoring in these conditions,” Ryan said.

“We've shown that we've won a game by kind of a different method, so the players are adapting.”

That was illustrated too by the strong defensive work that sought to limit the concession of goal chances
In their previous seven matches – since the commencement of the Wexford IAHC knockout stages and on into the Leinster championship – Davidstown-Courtnacuddy had found the net 25 times.

Here, they managed just one, however, while Kilbrittain had two, with Conor Hogan striking in the first half and Luke Griffin raising a green flag at a vital stage in the second.

Ryan and Kilbrittain had their homework done at both ends.

“Well, we knew we had threats,” he said.

“We knew that Luke and Conor Hogan and then Conor Ustianowski, if there was space in front of them - which Davidstown did do - we knew we had threats.

“The first thing we said to them at half-time was that we had made three clear-cut goal chances but only taken one - so we should have had two - and they didn't create any goal chances.

“We felt that if we were solid at that base, then we'd be in with a shout, basically, at the end of the game. If you look at the amount of points they've scored over the championships, it's been 12, 14, 15 points, roughly, but then you're topping on two or three goals to that.

“We felt that if we could just minimise them, we had a great chance - now, look, they hit the post, we need that luck, that's the way it goes.”