Blackrock facing upwards as they near full strength

The congested nature of Division 1 of the RedFM Hurling League is best summed by the situation Blackrock found themselves in last week.

Had the city side lost to Killeagh last Thursday night, they would have been in the relegation mix with two games to go but, instead, a 1-30 to 2-15 victory means they retain an outside chance of a top-two finish and a place in the final.

The Rockies moved to seven points after as many matches, three behind Sarsfields in second and, just as importantly, five ahead of the bottom pair, Killeagh and Fr O’Neill’s.

Manager Jamie Harrington was pleased to be free of any possibility of dropping to Division 2, but the possibility had not been consuming his thoughts, either.

“I suppose so, but I hadn't really been paying attention to it,” he said.

“We wouldn't want to be relegated, obviously, but it's not something that was weighing on us.

“We're far more interested in getting as many guys playing as we can, at the right time. That's kind of important as well, that we're not throwing guys into a line where we have three or four newcomers.

“The balance is way more important than anything else.”

As is the case with most teams during the league, Blackrock were short of a full squad to choose from – beyond Cork star Alan Connolly, they were without Robbie Cotter, John Cashman and Kevin O’Keeffe while Tadhg Deasy is almost ready to return after a cruciate ligament injury.

“We're probably four or five away,” Harrington said, “but even if they were here, we wouldn't be playing them all.

“The reality is you're always looking to expand what you have, so if you think you have 20, you always want 22.

“Tadhg was watching on Thursday night, he’s ready to go again. Kevin's ready to go, John Cash is just about ready to move, so there's a few more to come back in.

“We're happy enough, we're very happy actually.”

While the concession of a pair of early Killeagh goals left Blackrock trailing, they soon got on top, aided by a firepower that saw ten different players score while goalkeeper Gavin Connolly served as a valuable playmaker with some excellent distribution from deep.

From Harrington’s point of view, there was satisfaction in the quality of the score-taking, particularly in a first half that saw them build a 1-18 to 2-6 interval advantage.

“Yeah, it was good,” he said.

“The pitch was in excellent order, but there was wetness in the first half on top, which made it a bit tricky, along with the wind.

“In the first half in particular, I thought we got some very good scores. We probably let in one or two goals that we didn’t want to leave in but sure that always happens.

“It’s just one of those days where we happened to get a good few back on a given day, and we played well.”