By Michael McMullan

THE hurt of last season has helped Lisbellaw to Sunday’s Ulster Intermediate showdown with Éire Óg in Clones.

The Fermanagh side lost out to Swatragh at Brewster Park in the opener 12 months ago but overcame the Derry champions at the same stage this year.

Luca McCusker missed out with injury last season and could only look as Swatragh left them wondering what might have been.

“We knew what kind of fight they were going to bring, so we had to be really focused and really ready for this year,” McCusker said of their rematch against the 2024 beaten finalists.

“We died off in the last 15 or 20 and we just didn’t show up for ourselves. That’s something we definitely targeted this year, to play for a full 60 minutes in that first game.

“If you get a bit of momentum in these championships, it goes a long way. It was a massive game for us this year.

“I was watching it on the sideline and could see the boys’ hurt straight away.

“We knew if we could get a good start in the championship; it would really stand to us.”

It was the same in the semi-final when they took on another title contender, Castleblayney, before emerging narrow winners to clinch a third final spot.

Lisbellaw had trained in Ballyconnell in the lead-up to the semi-final and knew that conditions were going to lend themselves to a battle. And so it turned out.

“Any time the ball went to ground, it was just a ruck ball,” McCusker recalled.

“We probably felt we might not have played at our full strength and we definitely could have played a lot better in certain areas. It’s good to scrape through a game like that even though you think you might not have played your best.”

It’s a first final for Lisbellaw since they lost the 2021 decider at the hands of Banagher. McCusker recalls the puddles in Healy Park and how the game shouldn’t have been played but also the regret of not having performed.

“That really knocked us back,” said McCusker, excited about being back in another final.

“It took us a few years to get back the strength and the confidence to get into this position.”

He was an impressionable teenager when Lisbellaw beat Cloughmills in their only Ulster success back in 2012.

Some of the players are still on board and carry the experience into this weekend’s bid for silverware.

“They know what it takes and there is a serious hunger for our young lads to get our hands on a title like that,” McCusker said.

“My age group, coming up, we were always told we were going to win something for ourselves and we haven’t yet.

“In 2012, there was a rather large teddy bear with a Lisbellaw jersey on it – it was mine.”

“We were firing it up when the boys were lifting the trophy and it’s still in photos now in the clubrooms.”

It’s still in McCusker’s attic somewhere. While he threatens it to dig out for the weekend, his eyes are on one thing. The aim is to channel their hurling and last year’s hurt into something memorable.