Quins guard against complacency
Having overcome local rivals Cork Church of Ireland 2-0 last week at Harlequin Park in the quarter-final, ‘Quins are on the scent of a cup victory once more, but this time they are determined not to allow themselves fall victim to the complacency that has cost them dearly before.
As captain Jason Black ruefully recalls, ‘Quins have been here before, going into a critical cup game as favourites against supposedly lesser northern opposition and seen their aspirations go up in smoke.
“Yes,” he admits, “that’s happened to us before. We played Civil Service in Belfast a few years ago and we were heavily favoured to win, but they held us to a draw at full time and won the tie on strokes. We were gutted; it wasn’t supposed to happen but it did.”
He says that ‘Quins coach Stephen Dale has been hammering the message home this week to all the players that whatever else might beat them in Kilkeel today, it will not be because they took victory for granted.
“OK, so we are going a little bit into the unknown because we know very little about Kilkeel, but what we do know is that while they might have very few individual stars, they play very much as a team.
“Some people were surprised that they beat Banbridge in the quarter-final last week 5-4, but what has struck us is the manner of that win. They scored all five of their goals from open play. That is most unusual,” the ‘Quins captain commented.
He added that while Kilkeel may have no stars and no players recognisable from the Irish international set-up, that did not mean anything in the context of the cup.
“I’ve played in three or four cup finals at this stage and I haven’t won any of them. But I know that if I’m to get to another one, we’re going to have to beat this team on their turf.
“Harlequins have never won the senior cup. We’ve won Club championships and stuff like that, but the cup is the oldest competition in the country and we want to win it. However, we have to take each game as it comes and while we came out on top of C of I last weekend, we know we have to do the same against Kilkeel.
“They will be playing in front of what is, apparently, a very vocal partisan home crowd and that is another thing we will have to cope with.
but we know that if we keep our concentration and play to the level we can play then we can do the business. What we can’t do is just go up there and take it as a foregone conclusion. If we do that we could get hammered off the park.”
For his part, Kilkeel coach John Bird last night promised ‘Quins “a very tough game” and he said the whole town of Kilkeel was anticipating a great cup tie.
He agreed that his side are very tough to beat at home and because there were no stars among them, they got most of their results on the back of solid team performances.
“They’ve renamed the ground at Macauley Park ‘fortress Macauley’ so that will give you an idea how hard it is to play here,” he said, adding: “his side were committed to playing as a team and do not have to rely on any one individual to dig us out of a hole.”
Bird said last week’s quarter-final win against Banbridge was “very satisfying” and he said that while they did lead 5-1 at one point before being pegged back to 5-4 in the tense closing stages, he felt his team deserved their semi-final place.
“If I had to single out one player from that game it would be a young lad called William Annett whose pace and commitment throughout was an inspiration to the rest of the players. We’ll be looking for more of that against ‘Quins,” he commented.
The Kilkeel coach said he did not know a whole lot about the Cork outfit, other than what they knew of their international stars - the Black brothers, Wes Bateman and Sean Nicholson (who doesn’t play today because of an ankle ligament injury) - but he said they were ready to face whatever was pitched in against them.
“The whole of Kilkeel is buzzing ahead of this game and we’re all looking forward to it. It will be a very tough game.”
