O’Keeffe salutes ‘once-in-a-lifetime’ win

THE scale of their achievement in adding a county senior football title to a Sigerson Cup victory was deeply appreciated in the UCC dressing-room yesterday afternoon in Páirc Uí Chaoimh.

For only the third time in history they have achieved a remarkable double, with 1927 and 1960 their previous successful seasons.

“It’s a fantastic year and this is kind of once-in-a-lifetime stuff,” admitted manager Paul O’Keeffe.

“We’ll definitely celebrate it tonight. That’s something I said to them before the game, 1969 was the last time, so it’s not every year that these things come about.”

For UCC stalwart Dr Con Murphy, this was an occasion to savour and he also forecasted the stars of this team would progress to establish themselves on the senior inter-county stage.

“It rarely happens that we win the county and the Sigerson in one year, and it’ll hardly happen in my lifetime again,” he said.

“For me to be involved with the two teams is an absolute privilege and I’m very proud of these players. We’re just delighted as we beat a great Castlehaven team there today. When we won it in 1999, we were outsiders and it was a very young team with not many of the players well known.

“Within three or four years a lot of them went on to be great players with their counties. I think the same is true for this team. You’ll see a lot of them go on to county senior sides now.”

12 months ago Sean Kiely experienced glory with his club Macroom in the Cork IFC and he revelled in the chance yesterday to captain a team to a senior title.

“We were delighted to be here and now that we’ve won, I can’t put it into words, I’m just smiling from ear to ear. It’s just a really historic year for UCC football club and I’m delighted to be captain. Greaney was the captain earlier in the year and it’s to his demise that he went to America, so I’m not complaining!

“Everyone was a leader out there today. Daithí’s penalty was key but he has no nerves at all. He didn’t even know the score I’d say, he stuck it away as if he was down in a field in Killarney with his buddies.”

O’Keeffe admitted that they had their homework done on their opponents and it paid off.

“They did us a huge favour in terms of preparation, the way they started in the semi-final. We set out our stall to expect that kind of a start from the Haven, so we were kind of ready for it.

“Mark Collins and Brian Hurley were the two key men for us to close down. We wanted to close down Mark, that was the priority because if you close down Mark, it’s a lot harder for Brian to get possession.

“When they drew level at 0-10 all, I thought we were in dire straits, to be honest. They had built a massive amount of momentum and you’d always be concerned when a team like the Haven starts coming at you. But look, we held out and we got the rub of the green, so how bad.”