St Brigid’s charting a trajectory to the top

FOOTBALL

ANTRIM

By Michael McMullan

ST Brigid’s are bidding to get their hands on the McNamee Cup in their first ever final at this level.

Under new manager Cathal Murray, they take on Rossa in Sunday’s Antrim Senior Football Championship showdown.

It’s exciting times for a club that were only founded in 1998 but Chairman Eunan Conway feels the story has many chapters left to be written.

“This is an exciting time for us,” he said. “It’s another step in the right direction for the club.

“We’re largely still about participation because we have huge numbers being introduced to games at camogie, hurling, ladies and boys’ football.”

Dermot Dowling and Conor McSherry founded the club in the parish hall of St Brigid’s Church. Conway was also one of the 12 founding members present and the club has flourished since.

They have ambitious plans for new premises in Upper Malone, close to the Mary Peters Track.

For now, they play out of the Musgrave Park base they have leased out. Their two pitches and club house are already maxed out with the number of teams they have.

They also rent out whatever other grass they can find and have a link with Belfast Harlequins Rugby Club.

The senior ladies’ team reached another final in recent weeks. They field senior and camogie teams.

A target is to be self-sufficient in youth hurling, given they currently are involved in Ard na Rí and Belfast Gaels amalgamation teams.

“We’re not quite there yet and we’re working on it,” Conway added.

On the front line, Sunday’s date with Rossa shows the progress of the senior football team after coming up short in a handful of semi-finals.

There has been a recent Senior League title. While it was another milestone, Conway offers some context – it came in the middle of peak holiday season after clubs had played many games without county players.

“It’s another mark that we’ve improved,” he said. “You take that 10 years ago, we were an intermediate club, so it hasn’t always been plain sailing.”

Indeed 10 years ago, as part of an amalgamation, they lost to Rossa in a grade ‘A’ minor final.

In recent weeks, St Brigid’s won the U16 A title and were beaten by reigning champions Portglenone in the minor semi-final.

“Our club motto was Mol an Óige (praise our youth) and about 12 years ago we made a definite step to do it,” Conway added.

“Now we’re fielding two football teams at minor. From having eight or nine players 10 years ago, we have probably 40 players available now between 17 and 18. That the dividend of investing in our youth, it is coming to fruition.”

When Rossa won their last senior title in 1991, St Brigid’s were still seven years from their humble beginnings.

It began with underage before a senior team emerged in 2004 that won the Junior Championship. Within two years they were intermediate champions. Kevin Madden led Portglenone to a semi-final replay win over St Brigid’s in 2009.

“A couple of years after that, we were relegated,” Conway added. “We lost an awful lot of players to Australia, to America, to London, to Dublin. We were down in intermediate football for three or four years before we beat Dunloy in the 2017 intermediate final, and we’ve been in senior football ever since.”

The road has been bumpy but St Brigid’s kept their collective shoulder to the wheel. The club self-fund one of their senior players in a role to promote Gaelic Games around all four schools in their catchment area.

At the core is the club’s “fun Sunday”, an hour at noon for what it says on the tin. Gaelic Games in a well-run environment that attracts hundreds of kids.

“We’re lucky, a lot of our current crop of players will go down and help out,” Conway added.

Last weekend thy hosted 20 teams from around Ulster and beyond for an U10 blitz at the Dub.

“Every day of the week there are multiple teams playing within the club,” he adds. “It’s all part of the urbanisation of the country, and people leaving small rural areas to join the city.

“We would still continue to have a big inflow of people from country areas and they bring their love of Gaelic games and culture with them.”

At the start, St Brigid’s was billed as a city club with a country heart. That has changed, with the love of games passed down a generation. The underage players of the early years are now bringing their own kids.

“We’re probably becoming a city club with a city heart because the youngsters we have playing are all city kids,” Conway added.

“The urbanisation is going at pace. There is Naomh Éanna in Glengormley, there’s Bredagh and Carryduff is the biggest club in Ulster.

“We’ve probably nearly 1,300 members. In that respect, we’re a big club.”

Aside from numbers, St Brigid’s does not yet have the same imprint in the communitythat long-established club teams have.

“There’s nothing as satisfying as seeing kids walking off a pitch with a helmet, a hurl and a sliotar or just enjoying themselves with a football,” Conway adds.

“They are getting as much enjoyment out of it as generations have gone before them have.

“Regardless of the result this Sunday, out of little acorns mighty Oak trees grow and we have had humble beginnings. The final will come and go. Rossa are pretty formidable opponents with a strong tradition and beat two very strong teams (Portglenone and Cargin).

“It’s a milestone, it’s very important to us at the moment. We want to go on a journey, to properly introduce a cultural heritage of Gaelic games in South Belfast.

“The work now will only pay dividends in 10 years’ time, like the work we did 10-12 years ago beginning to pay dividends now. You have to think in longer term plans.

“Winning is important and getting to the final is important, but it’s symptomatic of the direction of travel.”