This means everything, says magnificent McCarthy

A TEAM rarely captures the Munster Schools Senior Cup without at least one outstanding talent in its ranks, a young man who can turn a game with just one piece of magic.

It happened once again in yesterday’s highly entertaining final at Garryowen RFC ground at Dooradoyle.

The game was 20 minutes old and the wind assisted Castletroy were leading by a Daragh Frawley penalty goal. Christians threw into a line-out on their own 10 metre line but Castletroy skipper Paul Dooley and Frawley pinched the ball and scrum-half Peter Murray set his backs in motion. There didn’t seem to be a whole lot of danger when Diarmuid McCarthy, the livewire Castletroy centre, gained possession 40m out but he saw a gap through which he jinked one way, then another, before using his scorching pace to beat the cover and touch down at the posts.

It was almost as crucial as the dazzling stoppage time try he scored to undo PBC in the semi-final.

“This means everything to me,” said McCarthy at the end of a game in which Castletroy completed an amazing senior-junior double in the space of five days and in only the eighth year of their existence. “We always knew we could do it because we have been together for the past three years. The first day I walked into the doors of the school, I was with these guys and they’ve been my friends ever since.

“The team bonded well from the very start. We got a feel for it in our first match against Rockwell when our defence worked well and it continued from that. The try against Pres was a huge thrill and likewise today when the gap opened up and I took it on. No, I’m not a sprinter! I used to do it in primary school but now it’s Gaelic football with Monaleen, soccer with Ashling-Annacotty and I also play with Garryowen. This is only our third year in senior rugby and most of us have been a part of it from the start. We all came through together. We were in the B competition the first year and lost in the final of the Mungret Cup to Midleton. Last year, we were beaten in the quarter-final by St Munchin’s so you could say that officially this was only our fourth senior cup match.”

McCarthy edged the award for man of the match.

The degree of excitement among Castletroy players and supporters can only be imagined but as the dust slowly settled on this amazing achievement, those mainly responsible were quick to pay due tribute to both the squad of players and the mentors. The three names on everybody’s lips were John Keehan, Martin Burke and John Staunton. Keehan and Burke are both teachers in the college but Staunton, a member of the well-known Garryowen rugby family, works in Dublin and so has to make huge sacrifices to mastermind the work of the forwards. It clearly paid off in spades yesterday for this was as well drilled a schools eight as I have seen.

“John Staunton has been the brains behind the whole operation,” claimed Keehan. “He has put in a huge amount of effort. For the last month or six weeks, he’s been up in Dublin so we put our training sessions on at weekends to suit him. For this man to come down and help our forwards and for them to perform as well as they did is a huge credit to him. The rest of us are teachers in the school and he’s not. He does it off his own bat and this is the only reward he wanted.”

In spite of McCarthy’s decisive contribution in each of the last two games, this was by no means a one-man show. Up front, Castletroy had towering figures in the likes of Dooley and Frawley. Peter Murray showed himself to be a very clever number nine and the powerfully built full-back Cormac Joyce-Power (a Limerick minor footballer) looks a decidedly useful prospect.

Christians, of course, were rocked by the double injury to their number eight and captain Brian O’Callaghan and second-row Kyle O’Dwyer after only five minutes and will always wonder how the game would have turned out had they been at full-strength.

Pat Langtry, their Australian coach, understandably referred to the loss of O’Callaghan and O’Dwyer but wasn’t using that as an excuse except to state that: “We had to rejig our back-row and couldn’t implement our game plan. But full marks to Castletroy, they deserved it.”