JOE Blake didn’t need to be asked twice. Any chance he can get to promote Adrigole, he will. He’s proud of his roots – a trait that runs deep in the folk who call the Beara peninsula home.

So, on the Monday morning after Adrigole reclaimed the Beara junior B football title, his local paper arranged to meet Joe at the club grounds.

He was there early, waiting for us.

As the club’s secretary, he is a shoo-in for any future Adrigole tourism endeavour, reeling off an impressive amount of information about the club and its scenic surrounds.

Joe is slightly biased, but he insists Adrigole GAA Club’s pitch is the most scenic in the country.

‘If you go up high there in Mass Mount and look down, it’s spectacular,’ he explains.

‘You can see Sheep’s Head, the Mizen over there, Bere Island and back into Castletownbere.’

Proud Adrigole clubman Joe Blake.

Hungry Hill sits imposingly in the background. It’s on the club’s crest. Joe, dipping into the world of entertainment, shows his knowledge isn’t confined to all things GAA.

‘Many years ago, Neil Jordan made a film – he has a holiday home back the road – and Saoirse Ronan was in it. It was a vampire movie (Byzantium), and they actually put red dye into the waterfall for the film, so it was a spectacular sight.’

But we’re here to chat about football, and specifically about Adrigole’s triumph in the Beara junior B football final. With man-of-the-match Cormac Carey kicking 1-8 and super-sub Kevin Goggin landing three two-pointers, Adrigole emerged as 1-18 to 1-14 winners.

It’s a victory that means a lot to the club, even more so after the intermediate team had lost their county semi-final to Buttevant the weekend before. That was heartbreak, a fourth semi-final loss in four seasons. But the junior Bs banished the doom and gloom and brought the smiles back because football matters here.

‘I suppose it’s not just Adrigole, but Beara as well,’ explains Joe, a former Cork GAA PRO and a current Cork delegate to the Munster Council.

‘There’s no other real sport played here in Adrigole. I know there’s a bit of soccer played inside in Castletownbere, but where we’re standing here is the focal point of the community.

‘You come here on most evenings and there are people out walking on the walkway that we put down last September. People come to the pitch.

‘On the August bank holiday weekend, we put up a big marquee and run a four-day festival. It’s the focal point of the community.

‘We face a lot of challenges down here in Adrigole and Beara, with depopulation, unemployment and people having to move away to go to college or for work. But it’s the football that brings people back here.

‘You see lads coming down from Cork every couple of days to train, and people coming from Limerick and Dublin. It’s the football that’s bringing people back.’

At the Beara junior B final in Castletownbere, Joe met Adrigole natives who had emigrated, but returned for the final. One man was home from Boston, where he has lived for 30 years. Another flew home from London for the weekend of the final.

Adrigole GAA’s floodlit pitch looks out over the Beara landscape – and remains a focal point for the community. (Photo: Sean O’Shea)

‘It was like Cork winning the All-Ireland for them,’ Joe says.

‘These are lads who grew up playing football with Adrigole. They had to move away, be it to England or Boston, but they’re still great supporters of the club. The red and white of Adrigole means everything to them.

‘You could see that there were tears in people’s eyes, and that’s what it means to the people of Adrigole.’

Football is what brings people together here, and it’s the connection to home for those who have left.

Look at Darragh Carey’s Adrigole junior B team, made up of club legends in the twilight of their careers who still want to lace up their boots, as well as the next generation who are starting out on their own journey in adult football.

Fielding a second team shows there’s depth in Adrigole football now – around 46 players between both squads – and it is also an opportunity for players to line out with their home club. Again, football matters.

‘Take Mike Phil O’Sullivan and Kieran Greene O’Sullivan, for example. They played against Glengarriff. Twenty years ago, they played for Adrigole when we beat Grenagh to win the 2006 county championship final. Twenty years ago, and the two lads are still lacing it up!’ Joe says.

‘Timmy Shea was injured for the final and couldn’t tog out. Timmy Shea won a county senior title 29 years ago!

‘Then you have the likes of Callum Downing, who had a fantastic game. Callum’s only 20 or 21. Tom Harrington came on in the final, too. Tom is U18 this year, so he’s not allowed tog out for the intermediates. He came on and was absolutely outstanding.’

The journey isn’t over for the Adrigole junior B team as they have a county championship quarter-final this weekend, while the club’s centenary celebrations in 2027 are also coming into view – another chance to highlight the importance of this club in its community.

‘Football means everything to us down here,’ Joe says.

‘We’re delighted to be welcoming GAA President Jarlath Burns here in January, along with Tim Murphy, chairman of the Munster Council, to officially switch on our floodlights, which we’ve had here for the last few years, and launch our centenary celebrations.

‘It’ll be great that we’ll be able to have the Donal Jim O’Sullivan Cup here in the parish for a lot of next year during our centenary celebrations.’

And they know how to celebrate out west. That’s important, too.

‘You lose a lot more than you win in the GAA, and when victories like the Beara final come along, they’re pretty sweet,’ Joe adds.

‘In fairness to Darragh Carey, our manager, he was our captain in 2006 when we won the county championship. One of his selectors was Seanie O’Sullivan, who played against Glengarriff. Another selector was Kevin Goggin, and, of course, we have to mention John Crowley, who was a selector as well as manager of the 2006 team. There was a lot of experience on the sideline.

‘As Darragh was saying afterwards, you have to celebrate these days because that’s why training here in January and February makes it all worthwhile.’

And it’s what keeps people coming back for more, and that’s key to the survival and growth of rural GAA clubs like Adrigole.

That, and having passionate club members like Joe Blake putting their shoulder to the wheel.