Predicting the biggest club championship games around the country as Kildare final goes to Carlow

Niall McIntyre

There are 15 senior county finals taking place this weekend, across Gaelic football and hurling, on one of the biggest club weekends of the year.

The Dublin senior club football final between Kilmacud Crokes and Ballyboden St Enda’s takes top-billing on Sunday, but there are a number of other eye-catching ties throughout the country.

The Roscommon football final between Boyle and St Brigid’s is an intriguing one, given that Boyle, home of the Smith brothers, are aiming to win their first senior title in almost 100 years. They narrowly lost the final to Strokestown last year and will be aiming to strike back this Sunday, against one of the county’s aristocrats.

The Galway senior club football semi-final between Mountbellew/Moylough and Moycullen is a heavyweight one, with Cumann Peile Mhaigh Cuilinn surely harbouring high ambitions after their All-Ireland semi-final loss to Glen last year.

Their opponents shouldn’t be discounted, with high-class players like John and Michael Daly, Barry McHugh and Eoin Finnerty in their ranks.

Meanwhile, due to the re-development of St Conleth’s Park, Newbridge, an unusual side-note of Naas and Celbridge’s Kildare senior football final is that it takes place in Netwatch Dr Cullen Park, in Carlow.

What makes it all the more unique is that Naas’ manager, the Éire Óg legend Joe Murphy, is a Carlow man.

“It’s really unique alright,” he told Naas GAA’s social media.

“It’s hard to know what to think of it.

“It’d be lovely to win it in Carlow but on the other side of it is that it would be worse again,” says Murphy, who won four Carlow senior titles in a row as manager of his home club recently, having won five Leinster titles as a player with them in the ’90s.

Carlow Native and Naas manager talks about the venue for this Sunday’s final!
⁦@KildareGAA⁩ ⁦@KildareFan2023⁩
⁦@JoeMallonMotors⁩
⁦@KildareNatSport⁩
⁦@KfmSport⁩
⁦@NaasGAA_SF⁩
⁦@TommyCallaghan1⁩
⁦@LeinsterLeaders⁩ pic.twitter.com/8W8sN9c0Jt

— Naas GAA Club (@NaasGAA) October 18, 2023

“It’s only up the road from my house,”added Murphy, who steered Naas to a county title in 2022, “I can walk to it,” he added.

Murphy took over as Naas manager last year, on the back of the team deploying a player-led management team due to a dispute in 2021.

The decision for the game to take place in neighbouring Carlow comes after the Lilywhites played their home All-Ireland SFC games against Monaghan and Dublin this summer Glenisk O’Connor Park and UPMC Nowlan Park.

Generally staged in St Conleth’s Park, the Hurling for Cancer game was also moved to Cullen Park earlier this year, with the Kildare county board opting for the Carlow venue ahead of any of their other club’s grounds in a meeting this September.

Kingscourt Stars clash with Gowna should also be a good one, while the Sligo final between and Coolera Strandhill and St Molaise Gaels will see one of those clubs end a famine. Coolera Strandhill haven’t won since 2005 while St Molaise goals have never won, and last contested a final back in 1978.

See our predictions below.