By Niall Gartland

BURT hurlers shook off the cobwebs with a convincing victory over Castlewellan in their provincial opener, and now they’ll take on Antrim side Con Magees for a place in the Ulster Junior Championship final this Sunday.

Enda McDermott’s side fell short on county final day against Setanta, but they were still afforded the opportunity to have a crack at the Ulster Junior Championship.

That came with a potential pitfall, however – they faced a whopping 12-week lay-off in between their Donegal Senior Championship final and the beginning of their provincial campaign. That’s something that continues to rankle with their manager, even though they proved much too strong for Castlewellan.

“I keep on saying it to see if our county board will pay any heed – we had 12 weeks without a competitive game which is ridiculous. It’s unfair on ourselves, Setanta and St Eunan’s. We’re all in the same boat and it’s no way to prepare for an Ulster Championship.”

That said, McDermott was delighted with the attitude of his players during the prolonged hiatus. The Ulster Championship was a tantalising prospect so they knuckled down on the training pitch.

“Since we started back at training, I’d say the minimum we had on any given night was 21 or 22 players, and that’s with lads away with college and work.

“We got back together a couple of weeks after Ulster GAA gave us word of our Junior match, and we all agreed we’d give it a really good shot. The boys looked sharp, the fitness was there and it’s great to get a game under our belts after such a long break.”

They don’t have anywhere near as long to wait for their next outing. They take on Con Magees this weekend, a one-week turnaround that doesn’t leave much scope for in-depth analysis of their opponents.

Speaking on Monday, McDermott said: “Obviously I have to sit down and look through reports, going through their team and seeing who did well.

“We don’t have an awful lot of information on them, though it was similar with our game against Castlewellan.

“We’d a few boys who watched the Down final, but we wanted to put our own stamp on things, and we’ll bring the same attitude to the semi-final.”

McDermott himself is a former Burt hurler who won a bagful of county titles during a massively successful period for the club. Setanta have won three of the last four titles, though Burt did come up trumps last year and McDermott is encouraged by the youth coming through the ranks.

“There’s a lot of young lads in training with us, who can’t play senior yet because they’re underage. It’s a good experience for those lads, hopefully it’ll ease the transition when they are able to play senior hurling.”

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