Delargy impressed by Cushendall’s freshness

By Michael McMullan

CUSHENDALL manager Brian Delargy leads his side into Sunday’s senior hurling showdown with Dunloy in his sixth year at the helm.

He has been impressed by the recent influx of youth and having missed out on last year’s final, the fire is burning in the belly again.

“The way things have worked this year, with a young team, winning the U21 championship, it has given us bit of confidence as well,” he said.

Seven of the U21s played in Cushendall’s semi-final win over Loughgiel and there is a feel of the new team. The club minor team also retained their title last weekend.

“I saw a report recently, that you need about 12 or 13 seniors to drive it on, but I don’t think that’s true,” Delargy said of his team’s development.

“It’s a community that drives the whole thing on. If you look at our senior team at the minute, while we have the older boys, the younger crop that came through last year were successful the whole way up.”

There is also a group of players who didn’t win a medal until they picked up two U21 and senior medals. Delargy has won the championship both as a player and now as manager.

“They get the same treatment, once you’re in underage, coming up through,” he said.

“It’s the same coaching, the same effort was put into that group for that reason, that once they get to senior, they can become a senior hurler.”

Delargy doesn’t see the medals, choosing to see the hurler who steps into the arena.

“In some teams, even the successful ones, you get the same number of senior runners out of that as the ones that aren’t successful,” he added.

A handful of last year’s minor group have stepped into the senior group but it’s about making sure there is a steady freshening of the squad.

“If you miss it a year or two coming up, it soon stops the flow of young ones coming in and giving that injection,” Delargy continued.

Tough battle

Looking back on their season, Cushendall’s league campaign was a tough battle with players both injured and on county duty.

They used the Feis Cup as a springboard into the championship. After losing to Dunloy in the group stages, they needed the quarter-final route towards Sunday’s rematch.

“We got a lot of momentum from U21 to start the Senior Championship,” Delargy said.

“We knew it was going to be tough, just building as we went through and we were happy enough.

“We had to dig deep against Ballycastle,” he said of the quarter-final being a benefit

“When you can see four goals in a match, I think it was nearly three goals in three minutes, we did have to dig deep and fight it out.

“That stood to us then coming into the Loughgiel game (semi-final). They’d already been there and we were able to go again, with hard work and make a fierce battle.”

Looking ahead to the final, both teams are in the same boat, having missed out on the decider last season.

“You don’t take these things for granted because when you weren’t in it last year, you want it and you missed it,” Delargy concluded.

“It’s nice because there is a good buzz about the town again and flags are still up from the camogie final and we had the minors.

“It’s a good time of year and there’s still people on the pitch and the lights are on.

“We appreciate it, looking back at the weeks in February and March, up in the top pitch doing the running, it is worthwhile to make it to a county final.”