No club championship peaks and troughs quite like the hurling in Kilkenny.
Win a junior county championship there and you’ll be fancied to go on and win Leinster and the All-Ireland too. Intermediate the following year isn’t as tough a challenge then.
A club like Graigue Ballycallan sums it up. They were in the All-Ireland senior club final back in 2001 but they were relegated a couple of years after and they couldn’t for the life of them make it back up.
Until this year. After years of losing semis and finals, the Kilmanagh club finally regained senior status when they won the most competitive intermediate championship in Ireland, beating Tullaroan in a thrilling final.
If you're not emotional watching this video, you're either not a hurling person or there's something wrong with you @SportTG4 @graiguebcGAA @KilkennyCLG https://t.co/pyoZFhsYOn
— SportsJOE (@SportsJOEdotie) October 30, 2018
Graigue Ballycallan know the tale well but they aren’t the only ones.
Every club in Kilkenny has their own experiences of the soaring highs and indeed the crushing lows. Take Bennettsbridge for example. This year’s county senior finalists were a junior club only four years ago.
They won the junior championship in 2014 and they went onto do as was expected of them, winning Leinster and the All-Ireland. Then, they went out and did the same thing in intermediate they very next year – meaning they’d gone two full years unbeaten in club hurling on county, provincial and All-Ireland stages.
Ask Carrickshock – relegated back to intermediate this year two years after winning an All-Ireland intermediate club, and they’ll tell you the same. So will clubs like Clara, who won the All-Ireland intermediate and the Kilkenny senior championship during the 2013 calendar year and Glenmore – winners of an All-Ireland junior club in 2016.
That’s just the way it is Noreside. The fact that there are only 12 senior clubs is a huge factor in this. It’s tough to become one of those 12 and if you slip back down to intermediate, you’ll sure as hell be up against decent teams there too. And junior isn’t far off either. There’s nothing between the lot of them.
The Kilkenny intermediate and junior champions nearly always do well after winning the county and 2018’s county kings aren’t breaking any trends.
Intermediate champs, the aforementioned Graigue Ballycallan are on the way to a Leinster final now. They took out Kildare’s Celbridge, after a scare, a fortnight ago and they gave Wexford champs Fethard a clipping on Sunday.
Sharpshooter Conor Murphy was again lethal for them on the frees in New Ross. Brothers Billy and Sean Ryan did plenty of damage from open play, while the evergreen Eddie Brennan chipped in with 1-1.
Fethard battled hard, Mikie Dwyer and Garrett Foley prominent for them, but there was no matching Graigue Ballycallan.
AIB Leinster Club Semi Final @kilkennyCLG
Full Time GBC: 2-22(28)
St. Mogues Fethard: 1-12(15) great win lads, well done— Graigueballycallan (@graiguebcGAA) November 17, 2018
Up next for them is Portlaoise in the Leinster final – that promises to be an interesting game for Eddie Brennan, Laois’ manager next year.
And the junior champions were similarly ruthless in their provincial last four clash. Dunnamaggin were beating Dublin’s best junior club St Maurs’ by 0-15 to 0-1 at half-time. They went onto win by 20 points.
Leinster Club Semi-Final
Full Time@DunnamagginGAA: 1-25(28)@STMaursGaa: 0-8(8)— Dunnamaggin GAA Club (@DunnamagginGAA) November 17, 2018
Both of them into a Leinster final. Both of them will be hard stopped.
