Cork Church of Ireland’s fairytale journey derailed

C of I captain John Jermyn told this newspaper in 2012 upon returning from Belgium that he had hoped to win a senior cup with his hometown club, which seemed a fanciful notion at the time as they had rarely been near the competition’s business end since their last victory in 1999.

But their campaign was galvanised by a 4-3 quarter-final win at Lisnagarvey that was considered to be one of the biggest shocks in the competition’s history, and they backed that up by seeing off Railway Union on penalty strokes in Saturday’s semi-final.