Glenravel hurlers inspired from within

IT has been a busy championship season for Antrim club Glenravel with the hurlers, camogs and ladies footballers all bringing home the silver.

The ladies saw their Ulster adventure was ended by Lisnaskea. The camogs have a final with Dungiven to look forward to.

As for the hurlers, they step into the provincial arena when Traugh visit Cushendall this weekend at junior level.

“The ladies’ football and camogie teams, they inspired us to get to this point with the hurling,” said Eoin McCusker, an intermediate football winner in 2023.

“They have set the bar for our club for the last four or five years. They’ve won intermediates, they’ve won junior All-Irelands and we just wanted some sort of success.

“The hurling, in the last couple of years, we were up playing intermediate. We were competitive enough but just couldn’t really get the crack at it we wanted.

“Now, we’ve a younger team, able to properly have a go at it this year and got through it alright.”

The core of the hurling team is in their mid to early 20s with an influx of teenagers.

Two factors helped their path towards a junior hurling title and an upcoming Ulster campaign.

After balancing both codes for the season, they missed out on the knock-out stages of the Antrim Senior Football Championship. It left eight weeks of hurling as the main focus.

Secondly, the season’s crossroads moment proved to be their semi-final against a fancied Gort na Mona side.

“It definitely was the turning point,” joint-captain McCusker pointed out.

“We knew going into that game they had very good players but experience was probably something we didn’t have at that point.

“At half time, we had cool heads and a couple of older players would have given us guidance, boys that weren’t playing on the day.

“In the second half, we showed what we were about. We just knew it would come against Armoy in the final if we put the work rate in and we showed up in spades.”

Second-half goals from Conleth O’Loan and Callum Higgins shot Glenravel to glory with McCusker and Brian O’Neill left to accept the cup.

“It was brilliant and it never gets old,” McCusker said of the winning feeling.

“It just shows the management had worked really hard the last two or three years.

“There were question marks about the players, question marks over hurling in the club and we sort of answered it, something that probably doesn’t get the credit where it’s due sometimes.”

For Glenravel, they had to prove it and the designated focus on hurling in over the last eight weeks paid dividends.

“The fitness was always there between both (codes) and it was well managed this year getting us to that point,” McCusker added.

“We always knew we had the skills to do it, it was just about getting our repetitions in.”

Next up is a Truagh team who have a win under their belts in Ulster, coming through against Omagh in the preliminary round.

“Both teams are at this stage of the year, you’re committing a lot this season and you want to try and get the best outcome you can,” he concluded.

“We’ll plan for it; we’ll play as hard as we can and see what happens.”