GERARD O’KANE: Alive and kicking

Club championship is truly live and kicking. Every county in Ulster is now into the knockout stages, with the final pairing decided in Down already.

By the time the weekend is out, they will also be decided in Cavan, Tyrone, Armagh, Donegal and Antrim. Derry are a little behind, with the quarter-finals kicking off this weekend, but knockout was well and truly started over the last few weeks, with back-door games and relegation games taking place.

The biggest surprise so far has been that Kilcoo are not in the Down final for the first time in 15 years. In those 14 years, they have won 13 titles, so the pairing of Burren and Clonduff is definitely a novel one. Whether this is a changing of the guard or not is another thing, but like all winning runs, it is difficult to keep churning out results year after year after year.

For a rural parish like Kilcoo, the crop of players they have had has truly been generational and trying to keep that going is nigh impossible. Once those lads reach a certain age, like Conor Laverty, and start to ebb off one by one, or players like Jerome Johnston become unavailable throughout the year, replacing those players like for like is simply not an option. No matter how good an up-and-coming minor is, there is no way they can just step in and replace experienced men like that.

Burren are the only team to have broken the Kilcoo stranglehold during that period of dominance, and they will be looking to add to their haul of titles, but Clonduff have been there or thereabouts. It was only two or three years ago that Kilcoo beat them in a penalty shootout, where Clonduff had a penalty to score and knock them out, so it is not as if this team doesn’t have the quality within its ranks.

Burren probably have a bit more experience. They will have men with a championship medal in their pockets, and they have a batch of minors who won an Ulster title with St Paul’s 10 years ago. I am not sure how many of them are still playing, but like a lot of other teams, it just shows that success is not linear or instant and you have to keep persevering at it.

Within Derry, the same four teams have managed to be at the semi-final stage in the last four years. Magherafelt, Sleacht Néill, Newbridge and Glen have contested the semi-finals in the last three years, showing that there is a distinct top four. We had seeded group stages at that time, so it was easier for them to keep winning and avoid each other until that stage.

This year, with an open draw, Sleacht Néill were paired with Magherafelt early on. Sleacht Néill were defeated, and the other three ended up straight into the quarter-finals, but Sleacht Néill have regrouped, won back-to-back games and are now in the quarter-final. They also managed to avoid any of those three teams, so as luck would have it, they avoided all three in the draw.

Now, I say this with the utmost respect to all the teams in the quarter-finals, but it would be a shock for any of the favourites not to go through. Teams like Ballinderry and Lavey, who have been looking to make that breakthrough for a few years now, will come out swinging. They have the history and pedigree and, in both changing rooms, they will have a mantra of ‘why not us’. So it will be interesting to see.

All four games going the direction of the favourites is likely, but that’s no guarantee. Owenbeg will be the place to be in Derry all weekend to see the action unfold.

Why not us?

Similarly, across the Sperrins, both Donaghmore and Edendork will carry the mantra, ‘why not us?’ or ‘this is our time’. Both have been fairly impressive in the championship so far. In their respective quarter-finals, they posted massive scores.

Edendork have been a stable senior team for a few years now and, with that sprinkling of quality and numerous All Stars among their ranks, they pose a threat for anyone. Donaghmore are slightly different: a young team arriving on the stage looking to make a breakthrough.

In the last few years, successful Tyrone underage teams have been littered with Donaghmore players, and the senior team sheet now has a sprinkling of Donaghmore players. Add to the fact that their minors completed three in a row county championships in 2024, and this is a club and a team which has been on the rise for a few years now.

Have they arrived too early? Well, given their performance in the replay versus Carrickmore, most would argue no.

Whichever team wins it out will be competing in their first county final – Donaghmore’s first since 1960 or Edendork’s first ever – so expect manic scenes at the final whistle either way. Beyond that, they will just have the small matter of either Errigal Ciaran or reigning champions Loughmacrory to deal with, but that is a matter for another day.

It will be all hands to the pump on Twitter all weekend for most. Sitting at one set of games while updating Twitter to see results from another venue – you have got to love championship football.