Urhan’s 11-month wait for a junior championship game

BY MATTHEW HURLEY

URHAN have had a longer wait for a championship game than any team in the last eight of the Cork Junior A Football Championship.

Their last championship match was their Cork JAFC semi-final against Boherbue on November 16th, 2021. Now, 333 days later they play Carrigdhoun champions Kinsale this Saturday (in Dunmanway, at 4pm) in a quarter-final of the Cork JAFC. 

As the only Beara team at junior A grade, Urhan are automatically the division’s representative in the county series.

They’ve waited a long time for this clash with Kinsale.

‘The preparation has been good. We had a long year with the league starting at the start of March. We’ve been training since February without a championship game,’ explained manager Martin McCarthy.

‘It’s been a bit long winded but in fairness to the lads, they’ve prepared well. Any challenge games we got, they contributed well. The last few weeks those challenge games have posed different types of threats.’

This is the game Urhan wants to win. Last season they beat Bride Rovers in the quarter-final to win their first game in the Cork JAFC in 14 years. That meant a lot to the club. So too does the upcoming game in Dunmanway.

‘It’s very important to the club, management, players and supporters. We’ve had great support this year whether it’d be underage, junior Bs, U19s and we’re hoping for the same with the junior As,’ McCarthy said.

‘I know from my own experience as a player that these lads want to go and represent Urhan with pride. They’ll go out and throw everything at this game. They want to test themselves against the best in the county and progress.’

With no league or championship matches for the Beara side since around April, they had to focus on challenge games to get them ready for the county series. They’ve played five challenge games. The good news is they have a strong panel available for the battle with Kinsale.

‘We have been between two squads, our Junior Bs were in a Beara final recently and they won that. A lot of Bs would have been training with the As. Numbers would have been decent, just hoping injuries will come right. It’s a fairly balanced squad. We don’t really have any stars as such, we’re an even enough team,’ McCarthy admitted. 

A few of the panel members were in action for the Beara U19s against Castlehaven in the county premier 1 final last Saturday. Looking past this weekend, Urhan will line out in the new Cork Premier Junior Football Championship grade in 2023 – and that’s good news for the Beara team.

‘The new competition will give us more games, which will be a positive for the development of our players. I’ll be honest though, once it did get brought in, the players haven’t even spoken about it once. We didn’t talk about it in training, we now have a junior A football championship to prepare for. We can only perform the best we can,’ McCarthy concluded.