BY JOHNNY CAROLAN
THE second round of the 2017 Cork Intermediate Hurling Championship provided a novel West Cork match-up.
This was during the brief period when first-round winners would clash in round 2A for a chance to progress to the latter stages, with the losers facing off in round 2B, looking to keep their seasons alive.
With Kilbrittain having overcome Castlemartyr in their opener and Barryroe getting the better of Carrigaline, the Carbery neighbours were paired together – the first time for such a match-up in a Cork county championship match.
It was the first time that the clubs’ first teams had clashed in a championship tie in 32 years and, for those of a certain vintage, such a notion would have seemed almost unbelievable. In the early 1980s, they were the front-runners in the Carbery JAHC – Barryroe beat Kilbrittain in the final in 1981 and 1982, then the Ambers gained revenge in a 1984 semi-final before seeing off Bandon in the decider.
While they lost the county final that year to Midleton’s second team, Kilbrittain bounced back and retained the south-west title, beating Barryroe in the 1985 final. After going on to win the county that year, Kilbrittain spent a decade at intermediate before a four-year stint at senior. While Barryroe made it out of the junior ranks with a county title in 2007, the clubs’ paths did not cross in the three years before Kilbrittain won the IHC and had a brief period at premier intermediate.
The 2017 clash – a 2-16 to 1-9 win for Kilbrittain in Clonakilty, with goals from Declan Harrington and Pat O’Mahony – would not stand alone for too long, however.
The group-stage format, introduced for 2020, has of course been a factor in that, with 12-team grades and each of them guaranteed three matches. In that first year of the new system, both clubs formed part of the Lower IHC grade and were drawn together – they met in the first round and drew 0-12 each in Timoleague.
Kilbrittain qualified from the group whereas Barryroe did not but, despite making the semi-finals that year and then the final in 2021, they couldn’t break out of the fifth tier.
For 2022, there was a change as the competition was renamed as the Premier JHC but the familiar sight of Kilbrittain and Barryroe emerging together remained. This time round, it was the last set of fixtures, with Kilbrittain’s 3-15 to 2-11 win in Ballinspittle giving them a 100 percent record and extinguishing their opponents’ slim hopes of qualification. Mark Hickey scored 1-7 for the winners with Philip Wall notching 2-1 while Barryroe’s goals were scored by Ryan O’Donovan and Robbie Kiely.
Kilbrittain went on to make the semis again, losing to Tracton after extra time. When they had to face into a new PJHC campaign for 2023, they could almost have predicted who would be joining them.
The Indian sign over Barryroe couldn’t last and the two-tone blues, having beaten Ballygarvan with a late goal in their opener, made it two wins from two as they beat Kilbrittain at Ahamilla. Olan O’Donovan’s 1-5 was vital in a 1-14 to 2-9 triumph, Kilbrittain’s goals from Wall and Conor Hogan.
A third win, over Milford, earned Barryroe an automatic semi-final spot, with Kilbrittain going through in second before losing out to Glen Rovers on penalties in the quarter-finals. Barryroe would be beaten by eventual champions Erin’s Own but the year had to go down as a success.
As memorable as it was, they and the other 11 sides line up at the same point on the starting grid for 2024 – and you could probably have predicted who they would get in the group phase. As with 2020 and 2023, Ballygarvan also join the Carbery pair, who also have last year’s junior A champions Nemo Rangers for company.
Friday night’s local derby in Clon (7.30pm) will be a pointer as to what might follow, but, unlike those pivotal clashes of the 1980s, it is not do-or-die. The winners will of course be buoyed as they target progress, but it does at least come early enough to allow the losers the chance to bounce back.
