Nemo rematch gives Clonakilty a shot at shattering the 'big three' of Cork football

Selector Eoin Ryan feels there's no reason they can't win the repeat of last year's quarter-final

Marked by many as the team best placed to tackle the big three – it hasn’t quite gone to plan so far for Clonakilty.

But the Carbery outfit finished the group stages with an emphatic win over St Michael’s, a result that pits them against last year’s beaten finalists in Nemo Rangers, the same side that defeated them at the quarter-final stage last season.

For selector Eoin Ryan, there’s no reason they can’t get the result this time around.

“The reality is, three years ago we were only a point away from St Finbarr’s in a county final,” Ryan begins. “They were beaten in extra time of an All-Ireland semi-final by the All-Ireland champions.

“There’ll be 12 of those guys playing [against Nemo], and what’s after coming into it is young footballers who are good footballers, so we’re confident.”

REPEAT PAIRING

While the game was pushed back a week due to the rain last Sunday, the same decision should have been made with this fixture last year, which was played in torrential conditions.

“Last year's defeat to Nemo shouldn’t have been played at all really,” he admits. “It was a joke, to be honest with you.

“Obviously when you’re beaten ,you look back and you're disappointed, and that was no different. We're disappointed we didn't win.

“We felt that we didn't do ourselves justice either, but that’s the way it is.

“We know what we have, we just want to get them to perform, and once they give us a performance, we're happy with that.

“How far that will take us, is how far it will take us.

This big three – they’re always there or thereabouts, Castlehaven, Nemo Rangers and St Finbarr’s.
“At the end of the day we look at ourselves and we try and improve, we try and play football to the best of our ability, we try to play football that suits our guys,” Eoin explains. “Every given match is different, what the big three have that other teams don’t have is consistency every year.

“One club might go well for one year, whereas these three do it consistently.

“That’s where we’re aiming to get to, that consistency.

“We’ve a lot of young fellas, the average age would be young enough on our team and we feel like we’re going in the right direction.”

To achieve that consistency has proven to be a real challenge for the other nine teams in the grade, and while Clon have faced some disruptions in that regard, there’s still time to make 2024 a campaign to remember.

“Our goal in the league was to win it and come out of Division 2, which we did successfully. That was a plus, and our aim was to make an impact in the championship.

That's there for us if we want it.
“Overall, our league form was good enough, but I would have been disappointed with us in the final. I don't think we performed, and the first round of the championship I don't think we performed.

“Carbery Rangers, we performed for maybe 45 minutes and then took our foot completely off the pedal, but I thought we performed well enough for the last game.

“The reality is our backs were to the wall – we had to do it. Even a win mightn’t have been enough for us to get through, we had to win well, in case Carbery Rangers beat Castlehaven.

“The championship form, the graph is going the right way. So hopefully we keep it going the right way. We're looking forward to the game against Nemo. Obviously Nemo are Nemo and it's going to be tough, but we feel we're well prepared.”