Paul Rouse: Are the Fitzgibbon and Sigerson Cups still relevant in 2022?

There is no doubt that third-level competitions are under pressure given the on-going revision of the calendar and the move to a split season between club and county.

Cian Lynch in action for Mary Immaculate College Limerick in the 2016 Fitzgibbon Cup final. Picture: Eóin Noonan / Sportsfile

“People who have never come in contact with the Fitzgibbon Cup can never quite understand the emotions it stirs in those who have. It is like the players become family. You eat, drink and sleep hurling for the duration,” wrote Nicky English in his autobiographical description of his time in UCC at the beginning of the 1980s.

At UCC, his playing career was reshaped by the coaching of the inimitable Fr Michael O’Brien. “I had never come across anyone like him before. We would train ferociously in the Mardyke where he barked his instructions like an army officer. . Those training sessions were Heaven for me as – physically – I started to become much stronger and I loved the drills he would have us perform.”