Dermot Coughlan hopes hard work pays as Clare minors aim to end 67-year wait

A first Munster MFC title in 67 years “would be massive for the development of Clare football”, manager Dermot Coughlan has said.

Clare meet eight-in-a-row-chasing Kerry in this evening’s Munster minor football decider, the third time in four years these two counties have made up the final pairing.

The 2017 and 2018 finals ended in 24 and 20-point routs by the Kingdom, but such has been Clare’s impressive journey to the county’s latest provincial final that the one-sided nature of the games two and three years ago is unlikely to be repeated at LIT Gaelic Grounds.

Clare kicked 1-24 when scoring a 20-point win away to Tipperary in the quarter-final, while 4-20 was run up away to Limerick in last week’s 19-point semi-final hammering of the Treaty County.

Twelve different players have found the target across their two outings to date, with Cillian McGroary top-scoring with 2-7. Just behind him is Diarmuid Fahey with 1-8. The pair were members of last year’s starting team, as were midfielder Brendan Rouine and half-forward Dara Nagle.

In his first year at the helm in 2019, Dermot Coughlan was unable to deliver a third successive provincial minor final appearance, but their season was arguably more impressive than both 2017 and 2018 given Clare came through the new round-robin series and then ran Cork and Kerry to four and eight points respectively in the Phase 2 round-robin.

Clare’s closing of the gap to the province’s top two is attributable to the work being done at development squad level, according to Coughlan.

“If the right work is put in, you will reap the rewards and Clare teams will start producing against the bigger counties, will be competitive.

“There is a big effort gone into Clare football from development squad level up. For all the work that has and is being done, we are starting to reap the rewards now with a third Clare team in a Munster final in four years. We’re absolutely delighted to be in our third minor final in four years,” said the 1992 Munster SFC medal winner.

“It would be just massive,” replied Coughlan when asked what victory at LIT Gaelic Grounds would mean to Clare football.

“It would be massive for the development of Clare football and to these lads who are involved now to go on to U20 level and to senior eventually. It would be massive to drive the whole lot again and give a further push to the development squad system over the next number of years.”

The manager was effusive in his praise of Munster Council who he said “could have easily washed their hands” of the 2020 Munster underage championships.

“They turned something out of nothing. There were two lockdowns, the second of which didn’t end until December 1. They could have easily washed their hands of this year’s minor championship. They could have easily said, ‘lads, not this year’. But they found a window. That window was from December 1-22. They made the most of it. They made sure lads weren’t going to miss out. To everyone involved, massive credit.”

There are two changes to the Kerry team for this evening’s game. Cillian Burke, who was introduced at half-time in last week’s win over Cork, is named at left half-back, while Darragh O’Sullivan comes in at corner-forward. O’Sullivan kicked 0-5 (four frees and one mark) when sprung from the bench in the 39th minute of the county’s extra-time semi-final victory. Conor Horan and Ruairí Burns are the two players who drop to the bench. Clare are unchanged from the side that comprehensively beat Limerick.

CLARE: T Collins (Lissycasey); M O’Loughlin (Corofin), F Guinnane (Kildysart), D Rouine (Ennistymon); O Cunningham (Killimer), F Kelleher (St Joseph’s Doora Barefield), J Guyler (Ennistymon); B Rouine (Ennistymon), B McNamara (Cooraclare); D O’Brien (Kilrush), C McGroary (Corofin), D Nagle (St Joseph’s Doora Barefield); E Killeen (Doonbeg), C Riordan (Wolfe Tones), D Fahy (Ennistymon).

KERRY: S Broderick (John Mitchels); C O’Donoghue (St Mary’s Cahersiveen), J Nagle (Austin Stacks), D O’Callaghan (Kilcummin); P O’Leary (Gneeveguilla), A Heinrich (Austin Stacks), C Burke (Milltown/Castlemaine); O Maunsell (Na Gaeil) (Captain), C Ó Connaill (Castlegregory); K Evans (Keel), W Shine (Killarney Legion), T O’Donnell (Castlegregory); C McMahon (Dr Crokes), A O’Shea (Listry), D O’Sullivan (Churchill).