A season of sorrow and steel as St Nick's target semi-final spot: 'We've overcome a lot of obstacles to get here'

St Nick’s manager Robert Brosnan says his side’s resilience has been the defining feature of their season as they prepare for Saturday’s McCarthy Insurance Group Premier JFC quarter-final against Kinsale in Shanbally (3pm).

After the heartbreak of last year’s county final defeat to Buttevant, Brosnan believes his group has grown through adversity and arrives at the knockout stages hardened by experience.

“It’s been a very challenging campaign,” he said.

“Last year went very smoothly for us, but we’ve had a good deal of injuries and a bit of adversity to contend with. Unfortunately, one of our selectors, Diarmuid O’Driscoll, passed away this year. 

"He was a huge part of everything we’ve done. It just shows the resilience of the group that we’ve been able to overcome a lot of those obstacles and find ourselves back in the knockout stages.” 

Since taking charge, Brosnan has overseen a period of renewed momentum at the club, but he is quick to credit the underage work that laid the foundations. St Nick’s reached the U21 B county final two years ago and their minors compete at Premier 2 level.

“There’s a great buzz, but in fairness that comes from all the hard work done by underage selectors for a long time,” he says.

“We have good quality and good numbers coming through, which lifts everything. It was always going to take time for the club to get going again after a challenging number of years.” 

When he stepped into the role as boss, Brosnan didn’t arrive with sweeping speeches or grand declarations. Instead, he focused on assembling a strong backroom team and letting their collective standards set the tone.

“I didn’t say too much really,” he admitted.

“We just put together a good backroom team and got a lot of buy-in from players because of the effort we were putting in. Sometimes you get out what you put in.

“When you have numbers coming through from underage, the older fellas buy in because they can see the potential in the group.” 

Last year’s county final defeat to Buttevant still stings, but Brosnan views 2025 as a season where St Nick’s exceeded expectations.

Promotion from the Division 6 League and a run to the decider marked significant progress for a club long accustomed to outside doubts.

“Even when we were winning consistently and getting into quarter-finals of the county in the mid-’90s towards 2010 at senior level, everyone would still be saying St Nick’s should be relegated or they weren’t good enough,” he states.

“That’s something we’ve always used as fuel, and it’s no different today. We know that there are always doubters out there.” 

This year’s championship group was unforgiving — featuring last season’s semi-finalists Canovee, a derby against Na Piarsaigh, and 2025 County Junior A champions Kilmacabea — but St Nick’s emerged with conviction. Their win over Kilmacabea, in particular, was eye-catching last time out.

Now comes Kinsale, a club Brosnan sees as walking a similar developmental path.

“Kinsale are probably very similar to our own story,” he says.

“They’ve had very good underage success the last couple of years. They’ve obviously very good players coming through. Hopefully our bit of experience might stand to us, but it’s a knockout game — whoever wins moves on.

“We still have a lot of firepower to come back in who were unavailable against Kilmacabea. You’d be hopeful that will push us on again.”