Kilcummin chase elusive second title

THE year 1973 has as much significance for Kilcummin as it did for the Limerick hurlers until August, as it marks the last time they won East Kerry’s showpiece competition.

Indeed, 1973 marked the only time Kilcummin won the competition in its present form, having won the preceding East Kerry League in 1925 before the O’Donoghue Cup’s inception in 1954. The win in ’73 came after victory over Glenflesk in a replay with Kilcummin having beaten Saturday’s opponents, Dr Crokes, in the semi-final.

The drawn final finished 2-10 apiece before Kilcummin won the replay 1-9 to 0-7 with team captain Dan O’Dwyer their goalscorer in the second period.

That team included former GAA President and current MEP Sean Kelly along with his brothers Fr Larry, Dermot and Padraig. In fact legend has it that Fr Larry sneaked out of the seminary in Maynooth for the replay in a plan elaborately devised to make sure he could play!

The team was, of course, trained by their uncle, the late Fr. Brian Kelly, a County Championship winning trainer with Mid Kerry as well.

The Kilcummin team included distinguished figures within the club such as Liam Horan, Tim Sheehan, brothers Billy, Johnny and Micheal Doolan, Dermot Moynihan. Two other sets of brothers involved were Sean and Dan O’Connor along with Monty, John and Andrew O’Sullivan, the latter going on to be a chairman of the Kildare County Board.

It would be 30 years - 2003 - before the club would even see an O’Donoghue Cup Final again. In that final a Kilcummin team that had lost the 2002 County SFC final, suffered a heart-breaking late loss to Gneeveguilla where they let a four-point lead slip late on with six consecutive points giving Gneeveguilla a 1-11 to 0-12 win.

It marked the first of four East Kerry final defeats in the Noughties. The 2005 final was lost to Rathmore by a point, 0-8 to 0-7, with further losses in 2006 (3-6 to 2-6) and 2008 (0-7 to 0-5) coming at the hands of Dr Crokes.

Kerry senior players Michael McCarthy, Ronan O’Connor and Tommy Brosnan along with the O’Donoghue brothers Eamon, Kieran and Paul, 1997 Intermediate captain Seanie O’Leary and DJ Fleming were amongst those to miss out on the district honour for the club.

A decade on from the club’s last O’Donoghue Cup final appearance the current team contains just three starting team players from that 2008 final in Brendan Kealy, Shane McSweeney and Kevin Gorman.