By Michael McMullan

SEEING out the closing stages of games was a vital part of Loughmacrory’s historic first county title.

That’s the take of ace attacker Ruairi McCullagh who kicked six points in Sunday’s win over Trillick.

Playing in their first ever final, Loughmacrory controlled much of the game but two Ciarán Daly goals almost came back to bite.

Lee Brennan kicked the sides level before Gareth Donaghy notched the winner in the closing stages.

Loughmacrory were seconds away from toppling Dungannon in last year’s O’Neill Cup race until Conor McKee’s stoppage time goal shot the Clarkes ahead for the first time.

“We had full belief last year that we were going to do it. It just didn’t happen for us,” McCullagh said of their impressive performance against Dungannon.

“That just shows how much we’ve grown as a group. Carrickmore scored a goal here in the semi-final and we actually came back and won the game this year.

“That shows the building blocks we’ve done. We were able to see out the last 10 minutes of games this year compared to last year when we were under the cosh.”

McCullagh, like the entire Loughmacrory community, struggled to process the victory. Like so many winning camps, unbelievable was his word of choice.

“If you look at all the people out there, it means so much to us as a community,” he added.

“To see Nathan up there, one of my best friends, lift that O’Neill Cup, it was a really special moment.

“Look, about our group, we trained so hard all year. In fairness to the management team, they know when to taper it up, when to taper it down accordingly for games.

“We had a fierce battle in the semi-final and a fierce battle the other day again against a fierce Trillick team.”

For McCullagh, the victory, puts Loughmacrory “on the map” after years of progression as they ebbed ever closer.

“People might never know about Loughmacrory,” he added. “We never made it to the semi-final before this year, never mind winning the thing.

“It’s unbelievable for the community, for the people in the school to have role models to look up to.

“When we were at school, we (senior team) were playing junior and it was tough times for the club, but we had to start somewhere.

“We brought it right from the underage,” he said, praising the effort in school.

“We won Ulsters in it (at school) and we got a core right through and everyone’s shown through now and, today, we’re all county champions.”