Town bid to grasp the moment

Bishopstown GAA Club was founded in 1957, and while in 2002 and 2004 their senior football teams reached county finals, Sunday’s hurling decider against Sarsfields will be new territory.

A large swathe of the current side won minor medals in 2002 and 2003, and followed that with U21 wins in 2006 and 2007. With a relatively young average age, one might think that even if the underdogs fall short on Sunday, there will be other chances.

Goalkeeper Ken O’Halloran knows that it would be foolish to take such a view, however.

“No, definitely not,” he says. “The club has been around for over 50 years and have never been here, so who are we to take that for granted?

“I don’t remember who lost the final six or seven years ago, it’s all about winning and we’re going to go out there to win.”

Though better known outside of Cork as the current back-up goalkeeper to Alan Quirke in the county football set-up, O’Halloran is just as accomplished between the posts in hurling, having played underage for Cork.

His gravitation towards the net was as a result of a different sport, though.

“I originally started off playing in goal with Wilton United in soccer,” he says.

“Then that led to me playing in football and when they were short a hurling goalkeeper I was seen as the natural choice as I was the football goalkeeper.

“I was just thrown in and it went from there. I always kind of liked it, liked being different from everybody else, you’re there on your own and you’ve your own job to do. I always kind of enjoyed it.

“When you’re in goal, you just have to be safe, you don’t have to be spectacular at all, once you do what you’re supposed to, then that’s enough.”

The Town’s run has seen them beat Glen Rovers, Douglas, Midleton (avenging a first-round defeat) and Ballymartle in quick succession to reach the final.

It might seem like slow progress after the underage wins, but O’Halloran points out that a young team had to mature together.

“When we won the intermediate in 2006, we had a very young team, but we had five or six older fellas.

“Donal O’Mahony, Brian Cuthbert, Mark Cogan and Martin Hayes had all been there for years, but they retired and didn’t come up to senior and we were kind of left at the deep end.

“It took a few years to establish ourselves at senior, and this year things have worked out.”

It’s all very different from last year, when Bishopstown had to beat Ballinhassig to preserve senior status. Another factor that O’Halloran cites in the turnaround is the surprise win of Carrigtwohill in 2011.

“To be honest, I think Carrigtwohill have given a lot of teams the belief that they can go all the way,” he says.

“It was them we beat in that intermediate final in 2006, and it probably gave us a wake-up call to think that we beat them with a young team and they were considered old at the time and they ended up winning a senior county, brilliantly.

“It just goes to show that if you do work hard, then anything is possible.”