CARBERY Rangers are aiming to reach a first senior county final since 2016.

They were different times, with Ross winning the senior title – then the top tier – by beating Ballincollig in their second decider in three years.

Sunday’s McCarthy Insurance Group senior A semi-final against Kanturk in Macroom (4pm) is Rangers’ first semi-final appearance since 2018 when they lost to St Finbarr’s.

‘No matter what kind of county final you get to, whether it be junior B or senior A, it’s going to be a great occasion for everyone,’ Rangers boss Robbie Ahern told The Southern Star.

‘2016 was the last time (we reached a county final). We have made two semi-finals since, in 2017 and 2018. For ten years, we were there or thereabouts in the senior grade making, being in semi-finals or finals. The last few years haven’t gone that way but this team is building. They’re coming through again, and hopefully we can make a county final and progress on upwards.’

Ross played in the second tier for the first time since 2005 this year, but wins over O’Donovan Rossa and Newmarket have built confidence. Daragh Hayes, Dylan O’Neill, Paul Hodnett and John O’Rourke have been in flying form, while football’s new rules have helped too.

‘Maybe the drop down to senior A level gave the boys a bit more confidence that they’d say, “right, we can go out, we can express ourselves.” Even though I think even if we had stayed up, that’s what would have come anyway because of the way the game has gone,’ Ahern added.

‘You’re allowed to express yourself and you’re allowed to be more adventurous. You’re just playing football. Football had gone stale for a number of years, no matter what you tried to do. The new rules have really helped a team like Ross, no doubt about it.

‘I think it’s the way that we should be playing football. We can mix it in other ways as well, but front-foot football is the West Cork style of football. Less tactics and more football is the way we should be doing it.’

After a first half where they found themselves 2-11 to 0-7 down against Cill na Martra, Ross have improved as the championship has gone on.

Even in that first game, they ‘won’ the second half by 0-15 to 0-8 and what followed were victories against O’Donovan Rossa and Newmarket that meant they automatically qualified for a semi-final.

There was the element of the unknown, though. If Kanturk had won their senior hurling semi-final against St Finbarr’s last Sunday, Ross’ semi-final would have been scheduled for October 25th.

Now they know they are playing this weekend, Rangers are ready for action. They have a full squad to pick from too.

‘The uncertainty about the fixture for the last week and a half was the big thing. We didn’t know whether Kanturk would get through to the final of the hurling and it did throw things off a little bit. It’s hard to get challenge games at this time of year too. There are pros and cons to not playing a quarter-final and going straight to a semi-final. Overall, it has been beneficial. We’ve got a few lads back training. However, a quarter-final would have been alright too,’ Ahern explained.

‘We lost the first game, which was disappointing at the time, but we knew that wouldn’t make or break our year. We had two more games to get it back on track. In the games against Skibb and Newmarket, they both came out and had strong starts but we wrestled back momentum fairly quickly. Those spells in those games set the tone, and hopefully we start that way the next day rather than having to wrestle it back. Momentum is definitely there at the moment.

‘We’re very happy with certain aspects of the last two games. You can’t deny the football we played was very good. I felt maybe, at times, we tried to protect leads and that’s not what we want to do. We go out to win every game and there’s no need to protect any lead. We need to keep going, keep playing the way that we want to play and teams will find it very hard to stop us.’

Ross have been going well in attack but have conceded six goals in three games as well. If they are to beat Kanturk, they will need to improve defensively.

‘It’s always a concern when you’re conceding goals. Luckily, we’ve been scoring on the other side too. A lot of the goals weren’t scored through great football. It was small mistakes that we have been trying to rectify. It has been something we’ve worked on the last few weeks,’ Ahern said, as a rejuvenated Ross hope to return to county final day.