Lost time and missing medals - this is a battle for legacy

Paul Fitzpatrick previews the county SFC final this Sunday.

On Saturday morning in Virginia, when the rain briefly subsided, a meitheal of men were out erecting bunting and flags. Raised high on a cherry-picker, a volunteer of a certain vintage was assisted by what looked like his grandson. A bonding ritual, you could call it. For family and club.

The drowsy streets are lit up with colour in weeks like these. In Ballyjamesduff, the flags are flying high and where the people stop to chat, football dominates. County finals are rare and what’s rare is wonderful and is rightly savoured.

A feature of the big day is that each one feels like The Big One. We buy into it every time – that this hour’s football will settle all accounts, provide the answers we’ve been seeking.

For those intimately involved, and even for those of us watching from the outside, a county final feels like the end of the earth, a point on the horizon after which nothing exists. Deep down, we all know it’s just a game but for now, the players and their coaches and families and everyone else are counting down the days and hours.

Castlerahan’s relationship with the county final is complicated. Love-hate, you could say. Last year, for the first time, they greeted the final whistle with a smile. Now, they’re back and the smile remains. Where once they played with the weight of the world on their shoulders, now they’re unbridled.

Having achieved their goal of claiming the Oliver Plunkett Cup, they could have gone one of two ways – either their bellies would have been full and, hunger sated, they’d have slacked off.

Or, they would be better than ever, the same team but playing with the new-found confidence of champions and without the weight of pressure which at times seemed to stifle them.

The latter has been the case. While they have brought through no new starting players – Oisin Kiernan, who missed the knock-out stages last year but was ever-present to that point, an exception of sorts – and have lost a starter in Kerryman Shane McSweeney, they look a better team.

They are composed and purposeful and playing with panache now, eschewing the ‘safety-in-numbers’ mass defence which once defined them for a high-risk, man-for-man strategy which can only work when a team has complete faith in the ability of their defenders to win their own individual battles.

A good example was in the group game against Shercock. Faced with well-organised, defensive opposition, the champions prodded and probed and figured out a way to break them down. No panic, just patience and faith that they would execute the basic skills well. It worked.

While they picked off two county championships since, the Cavan Gaels era of dominance has been over since they lost in Ulster in 2011, really.

They were possibly the greatest club team the county has ever produced and peaked when beating a callow Castlerahan by 16 points in that final but the run had to end some time. They have picked up two titles since but are now hunters, not hunted.

There was a period of flux after 2011, during which Kingscourt stole in for a title, as did Mullahoran and Ballinagh.

The usual pattern is that things then settle down and a new team takes the throne for an extended period. Without doubt, it should have been Castlerahan.

It’s not hard to make the case. No team has been as consistent as them in the second half of this decade. They have won three league titles and will play in a fifth Senior Championship final in succession this Sunday. That they have only one county title to show for their efforts is a freak  but football makes no concessions for sentimentality.

We purposely left Ramor out of the list of one-hit teams above. The others have not contested a final since they last won it and didn’t make a huge impact this year. Ramor are now back in the decider and – and this is amazing, really - will finish the decade with more titles than Castlerahan if they win on Sunday.

Wider context
So, Sunday’s game, as is always the case with this occasion, is framed by a wider context. Ramor will have their own thoughts on that.

When they broke through in 2016, they were seen as the princes ready to wear the crown. A small step forward probably would have been enough but they seemed to go in the opposite direction.

Now, they have a chance to make for lost time and missing medals, too. And they know that they are in with every chance. For one thing, they graph has been rising in recent weeks.

Take Conor Bradley. He spent the first part of the year in France and, while doing fine, has yet to hit the heights he is capable of. Lest we forget, Bradley was a sensation in 2016, dancing through defences and coming away with the Player of the Year award. Class is permanent and it’s likely there is a huge game in him.

Ramor are well-balanced in that the likes of Bradley and Simon Cadden, whose form has been excellent, can carry ball all day and can finish. The Virginia side are full of running from deep, with Jack Brady – now at centre-back – instrumental - but their most dangerous scoring threats are where they should be, in the full-forward line.

Ado Cole is a rare thing in the Cavan Senior Championship, a natural full-forward standing well over six feet who can win the ball overhead or in front and is agile enough to find space to kick off either foot. Beside him, James Brady is an old-fashioned poacher, quick and deadly accurate. It’s a potent mix.

The Castlerahan defence, though, is the foundation on which all else rests. They have a licence to get forward, and do, but their first duty is to leak as little as possible. It is rare to see any of them lose an individual battle but it should be noted that Cole has traditionally always seemed to spook them.

At the other end, they have excelled. Ronan Flanagan is having a career season at full-forward, where his handling and decision-making have been exemplary. His brother Enda has recovered from a virus in mid-season and is playing with great confidence.

Oisin O’Connell, as usual, brings pace, energy and a goal threat. The youngest of them, Karl Cosgrove, has improved greatly this year while Brian Ennis had his best game of the campaign last time out.

Chances are there won’t be much in it. Looking back at the winning margins of the last seven county finals – the post-Cavan Gaels era, if you like - is an informative exercise.

The 2012 final went to a replay, with a point between the teams after 59 minutes of the replay before Mullahoran struck a goal to win by four. The following year, Ballinagh won it by a point. In 2014, the Gaels won by the same margin. Then came Kingscourt, who saw Castlerahan off by two.

In 2016, it was a draw, Ramor winning the replay by two. The widest margin in the last seven renewals came in 2017 when the Gaels won by five but normal order was restored last year with Castlerahan’s one-point win.
So, excluding replays, the margins of victory in Senior Championship finals since 2012 have been: draw, one, one, two, draw, five, one. 

In recent seasons, the margins have been wafer thin. Last year, one of the quarter-finals and both semi-finals were draws. This year was much more open, with several lopsided games in the knock-out stages. After a period of flux, the best sides, it seems, are now beginning to assert their dominance.

Sunday is the last decider of the decade but there will be no full stop after it. It feels like a defining chapter for both of these outstanding sides but then again, county finals always do.

How will it read? For us, like this: Good teams win it once, great teams twice. The feeling is that Castlerahan’s status will be belatedly elevated by Sunday evening with a couple of points to spare.

But don’t bank on it.