The Kerryman (South Kerry Edition)
Super saints don’t break stride
St Senans determination to win back to back titles was evident from the get-go on Sunday
SO it turns out that North Kerry titles are a lot like buses. You wait an age for one and then two come along at once.
In a way we shouldn’t be surprised. Senans’ hunger was never likely to be sated by just one title. When you’ve got the team to go on and win more then that’s just what you have to do. If you didn’t know better and were watching the first half last Sunday afternoon you would have thought they were the team chasing a first title.
Senans’ hunger was ferocious, charging into challenges – fairly we hasten to add, this was a final played in a really good spirit by both teams – snapping up the breaks, closing down their opponents at each and every turn.
Brosna seemed a little taken aback at times by what Senans were bringing to the table. Liam Brosnan’s men simply couldn’t get their game going at all. Some of that was down we suspect to nerves, more of it was simply down to sheer quality they were facing. It just wasn’t the same Brosna team we saw in the semi-finals.
Senans, meanwhile, were an improved version of the side that took Tarbert apart in Ballybunion in their semi-final. Still silky smooth and classy with Barry Mahony pulling the strings out around the middle of the park, but with a harder edge.
A lot of the credit for that has to go to Seán T Dillon who gave a performance that showed why Peter Keane called him up to his squad ahead of the McGrath Cup and National League campaigns.
He was tasked with marking Brosna danger-man Paul Walsh and did a near flawless job on the eighteen year old – and it’s important to remember Walsh’s tender years here – even more significantly, however, Dillon brought a calmness and a composure to the thing that seemed to rub off on his colleagues.
As one patron remarked to us after the match, sometimes you need a county man to win championships and now St Senans (provisionally at any rate) have two.
“I could nearly say that Seán T could have got man of the match, but Barry was justifiable as well,” Senans boss Mark Bourke said post-match.
“The two of them were exceptional today and a few others as well. Mark Behan I thought was exceptional as well today. Everyone else put a shift in, but when you have the guys called into a county panel like that it does give it a sense of confidence for them and it lifts the team a small bit more as well.
“If they keep going with competitions like that a few more guys might get a call for a junior team, small things like that.”
For us arguably the single most impressive aspect of Senans latest success was that it was achieved with some many players missing from the starting fifteen. Down five from the Premier Junior Final in May, the Mountcoal outfit didn’t break stride, maintaining standards, showing an unbelievable strength in depth.
“We were down and you could see,” Bourke confirmed.
“Conor Kennelly declared himself to be fit during the week so
Mighty. Jesus Christ it’s brilliant to win a second one and especially with this bunch of lads – Jason Browne
that was a big bonus. Dave Foran came back Friday night from Dubai, that’s two big time players for you. Breandán Whelan of course is going on for years and has that game experience and that was three guys and three more came on and they were exceptional as well, everybody rose to the occasion really more than anything else.”
As the crowd swarmed onto the pitch after the match – caring not one jot about the rain as it swept in from the nearby Shannon – you could see just how much it means to win a North Kerry title, for fans and players alike.
“Mighty,” captain Jason Browne beamed.
“Jesus Christ it’s brilliant to win a second one and especially with this bunch of lads. We’d misfortune there during the year with injuries and things and lost the Junior final as well to Na Gaeil.
“They’re a great team obviously and we were nearly always going to be second best there, but we were missing a lot of fellas for that final and it was a big set-back for us, but we rallied again for this and it’s great to win it.
“We did, we definitely did [want to win it]. We wanted to finish out the year with a bit of silverware and especially after losing the junior final that wasn’t good enough to finish the year with nothing. We really wanted this. It’s a big one for us.”
The way Senans are playing, the experience they have, the quality of player they have at their disposal it’s hard not to look ahead to next April and wonder whether or not they might be in a position to go one better than last year and win the Premier Junior crown.
“Yeah look we obviously have to drive at it again,” Browne says.
“We have to regroup in early January and drive at it again. It was a huge disappointment to lose it to be honest. We put a lot into it and things and it was a big set-back, but look we rallied and we got this and it’s great.”
If Senans do go on and claim that county title we suspect that their manager Mark Bourke is going to have a key role to play. It’s quite obvious from talking to his captain the esteem in which he’s held by his players.
“He’s unbelievable,” Browne said.
“His professionalism is unbelievable by him, he gives it everything.
“We played his own club like in the County Final and he didn’t side with them, he completely came on board with us, he was a Senans man for the whole thing and his son was playing corner-back for them as well that day.
“Like I said there in the speech his son was playing in the Munster final last week and Mark was training us, he didn’t even go to the game, so his dedication to us is unbelievable.”
Bourke, of course, is far from counting any chickens.
“Every year is very tough in the junior club,” he noted.
“Look Gneeveguilla, Ballymac, Ballydonoghue, there’s a few other dodgy teams there that will look for this now next April. No you have to do everything right, you have to have a bit of luck, it’s five games in-a-row, five weeks, five games, we lost a lot of players over the five weeks to get to the county final so you have to have luck at that level.”
Whatever happens Bourke’s place in the affections of the North Kerry club is assured. The Tralee man who came to Mountcoal and helped end the famine. It’s clear that he – much like Liam Brosnan has for Brosna – embraced the North Kerry championship.
“They [the players] do train for this competition very diligently,” he said.
“We had forty eight training sessions just for the North Kerry championship and we’ve been going three or four times a week with recovery sessions and things like that. They have been very good, they’re a very good team to train.
“Seán Weir was never allowed the opportunity to play in this final and we thought that was a big motivating factor for us, to do it for Seán Weir and things like that. Jason Browne lost his grandmother during the week and he didn’t miss a training session and you see that and that’s why we do it, we weren’t going to lie down today.”
A serious outfit with a serious manager, the Saints go marching on.