'A classic case of familiarity breeding contempt': Barrs and Haven collide again

St Finbarr’s and Castlehaven meet in a knockout clash for the sixth year running, a rivalry goalkeeper John Kerins says has taken over from Barrs-Nemo. 

John Kerins said the 2021 Cork Premier SFC meeting of St Finbarr's and Castlehaven is the "standout game" from his time lining out with the Barrs. Pic: Eóin Noonan/Sportsfile

Buckle up. The Barrs-Haven bus is revving up for another spin. Control of the wheel is forever changing hands. The direct route is never taken, the scenic way round never disappoints.

Jamie Burns and Damien Cahalane were the two St Finbarr’s hurlers coaxed over to chat with Clubber following last Sunday’s quarter-final win over champions Imokilly.

Burns and Cahalane are the same age. They’re lining out together all their lives. Last weekend, they lined out in the same full-back line that kept the Imokilly inside line scoreless from play.

At the end of the interview, there was mention of Sunday's football quarter-final. How could there not be. Castlehaven and St Finbarr’s. A sixth successive knockout clash since 2020. Burns and Cahalane no longer comrades in arms, no longer spoiling in tandem.

Burns joked that the Barrs hurling bus pulling out of Midleton wouldn’t take the Castlehaven trio of Damien, Conor, and Jack.

“They’ll have to walk home, or they can take the train,” he quipped.

There were no team buses in October 2020. Covid wouldn’t allow it. Every player, mentor, and water-carrier had to travel alone to Páirc Uí Rinn on a horrid Sunday night for county semi-final fare.

John Kerins didn’t travel. The goalkeeper for the Barrs’ famine-ending county final win of two years previous watched the game at home on the couch. Garda College and injury meant he wasn’t near the set-up.

Steven Sherlock levelled in the 10th minute of second-half injury-time, Mark Collins delivered further stalemate in the final minute of second-half extra-time. Penalties would decide it.

“I was looking at it thinking, I’d love to be in the thick of that,” Kerins recalled this week.

New Barrs No.1 Patrick O’Neill saved two, as did the Haven’s Anthony Seymour. Sudden death required. Cillian Myers-Murray off the crossbar, Mark Collins with the Castlehaven clincher.

So as not to be outdone in any future shootout, penalties were incorporated into Barrs training ahead of the 2021 championship entering the knockout phase. Kerins, by this juncture, was back wearing the main gloves.

The Sunday before semi-final No.2, the Barrs A team edged their B counterparts in a mock shootout. Kerins saved two but hadn’t stood over one himself.

Fast forward seven days and 100 minutes of genuinely enthralling fare, and only four Blues men had raised their hand to take a penalty. Eoin McGreevy, Brian Hayes, Michael Shields, and Sherlock were a fifth soldier short.

From the couch to double jobbing. Kerins completed the list. His was the last of all 10 kicks.

He’d watched back the 2020 shootout in the lead-in to the ‘21 instalment. He’d written down where each Haven player had put their penalty. He handed the list to his understudy O’Neill before the latest shootout threw-in. If any Haven player on the list was again stepping up, O’Neill was to signal with a training bib whether they had gone left or right 12 months ago.

“I didn’t do what most modern goalkeepers do in putting the penalty preferences on a water bottle. But when the shootout started, I didn’t even take notice of what way he was waving the bib because I was so engrossed on the shooter in front of me.

“It was Rory Maguire who I had targeted, I knew he went top right [from the year previous], my top left.” Kerins guessed correctly. It was the sole penalty saved before he himself stood over the shootout’s 10th and potentially final kick.

“It was a case of putting the ball down, picking a spot, and hoping it goes in. Seymour didn’t move so that suggested to me that he didn’t expect me to take one.

“It is the standout game from my time lining out with the Barrs. It had everything,” said the two-time county medallist and son of the late Cork goalkeeper by the same name.

“In more modern times, this rivalry has taken over from the likes of Barrs-Nemo, purely because the two teams are meeting every single year. It is a classic case of familiarity breeding contempt.” 

A rivalry is only a rivalry so long as control of the wheel is frequently changing hands. Neither side has lost three consecutive games across the five previous semi-final meetings. As the Haven successfully prevented in ‘23, the Barrs bus must now swerve that unwanted first in tomorrow’s quarter-final.

“The lads want to get back in and say they are one up again.”