Neighbourhood watch: Skeheenarinky v Ballygiblin is a Munster final with a difference
Tom Maher, (left) chairman of Skeheenarinky, meets his Ballygiblin counterpart, Liam O’Doherty ahead of Sunday’s AIB Munster Club JHC final in Mallow.
Much like politics, at its heart the GAA is local. No matter how far up the ladder you progress as a player, everybody starts out the same with trips around their hinterland to play local rivals that will, in many ways, come to define them throughout their careers.
What begins as friendly jaunts as kids soon gives way to something far deeper and, occasionally, bitter as adolescence descends and the root cause of so much joy in the GAA is getting the better of your neighbours. Nowhere is this more prevalent than at junior level, where to get anywhere you first have to conquer those around you.
Bucking that trend in Mallow tomorrow, however, will be Ballygiblin and Skeheenarinky when they clash in the Munster club JAHC final in what will be the first-ever competitive fixture between two clubs whose roots have intertwined with one another forever. Less than five miles separate their pitches and after a season of travelling around Cork, Tipperary and Munster, both sides face into the biggest game in their history against friends that will briefly become foes.
The novelty of the situation is not lost on Skeheenarinky chairman, Tom Maher.
“We went up last year to play Shannon Rovers in an U16 challenge game up around Lough Derg and it took us an hour and a half to get up there! But there’s good old banter around the place. There wouldn’t be any great hatred between the clubs. You know there’s always the clubs that you’d hate playing, but you’d have to beat them! That isn’t there at all with this one and there’s a good friendly atmosphere around the place.
“Every year without fail we play Ballygiblin in a challenge game, we might even play them twice.
“We played them back in June or July last year and there wasn’t much between them. Around here, they all go into Mitchelstown CBS. We’d be the last parish in Tipperary that would go into Mitchelstown, any other parish would be going into Cahir.
“I know Willie Duggan (legendary teacher and coach in CBS) with years, and he trained me when I was inside in the Brothers, and we won a good few Cork titles while I was there.
“Willie would have trained 28 of the 30 lads that will be starting on Sunday. There’ll be a lot of lads starting that won the Munster ‘B’ Colleges back in 2018, the likes of Dean Finn, Darragh Brennan, Oisín Brennan and Tomás Vaughan. After the Munster quarter-final against Tralee Parnells (120 km from Skeheenarinky) we stopped off in the Corner House in Kildorrery to see if he was there so that shows the respect that’s there for him.”
Maher’s counterpart from Ballygiblin, Liam O’Doherty, is closer than most to the border and he also sees the importance of CBS to this particular story.
“Where I am here now, I’m probably within a mile of the border with Tipperary. There are five houses between me and the boundary. I went to school in CBS with the Mahers and Tom’s brother Eamonn was in my class. Most of the lads from Ballyporeen and Skeheen, I mean, we were all in school together in the CBS, not to mind the generation that’s there now. That makes it a very unique occasion.
“On top of that then you’ve cousins on both teams, so it’s interesting enough. My own lads here at home are related to the Brennans and there are two of them playing on the Skeheen team and my wife is a first cousin of their mother. We’re all neighbours, we all know one another well.
“There was a time when we met a lot in hurling tournaments. These days there are so many other things going on that there’s no time for the tournaments. Kilbehenny would often host one and they’d invite Araglen, Skeheenarinky and ourselves and we’d play off. But the current generation would have only had challenge games or would have played with one another in school.
“There is a nice bit of hype in the area, especially around here as we’re on the Ballyporeen side of Mitchelstown. We know them all, they know all of us, they’ve all played together going to school and that’s what makes it interesting I suppose.”
The magic of tomorrow’s encounter has gone beyond the environs of Ballygiblin and Skeheenarinky too, according to O’Doherty.
“Everywhere I’ve gone for the last week everyone has been wondering if restrictions will come back in and if there will be restrictions, they want to know how to get a ticket because everybody wants to go to the match. And now I’m talking about people from Kilworth, Araglen, Kilbeheney, Ballylooby and Ballylanders, not just Ballygiblin and Skeheenarinky. There are people as far away as Cahir that are talking about this match so there’s a huge interest from that point of view.
“It’s just unreal for the area. I mean, there are a few people who have gone before us who would have been real die-hard Cork or Tipp people. When Cork and Tipp were playing then, Lord God, the tension would have been unreal the day of the Munster final. But the day after, they could be drawing hay together. My wife’s uncle, James Fox, is a Skeheen man, my mother-in-law is a Skeheen woman. They’d be on the phone now wondering how we’re going and looking forward to the match and saying how they’ll have to stick to their own. They’re nearly forewarning us what to expect!
“We’re going into the game like we’ve gone into every game we’ve gone into, Ronan Dwane has the lads well drilled, we’ll give it our best shot and when we come back into the dressing room, if we’re beat, we’re beat but once we give it our best shot, we’ll be happy.
“There are a few people that are going to win whichever club wins because they’ve people involved on both sides as there’s hardly nine miles between the furthest away player from each team.
“If Skeheen are lucky enough to progress, there’ll be of Ballygiblin people at their next game.”
Tomorrow, for once, the age of détente won’t be far away when Cork and Tipp collide.
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