'Competition within squad is driving Knockbride standards' - McCabe

JFC final preview

It’s become a cliché that managers and players talk about the strength in depth in their panel but for Knockbride, it’s true. The Canningstown-based outfit have a large squad and several quality players have had to be content with cameos off the bench in this campaign.

For manager Aidan McCabe, it’s a welcome headache.

“Last week, we had 19 boys who had to start. Just had to! And sure that doesn’t work,” McCabe told the Anglo-Celt.

“And at that, you have another three, four, five boys who you could start without any worries at all who just haven’t got the time so far in the championship but have played some league football.

“That makes it very, very competitive, it means we have good options but we have to make that count in every game.”

Knockbride sat down at the start of the year and vowed to put absolutely everything they had into winning this Junior Championship. McCabe has steered them to wins in the Ulster League, the Division 2 ACFL League and a Reserve League (they are also in the Reserve Championship final) but he laughs off any suggestion that he is a lucky charm.

“If I take credit for this I also have to take credit for last year when we were in a relegation play-off!” he grinned.

“We have stepped it up an awful lot, we made a conscious decision at the start of the year – senior players, reserves, everyone – that we weren’t where we felt we could have been last year and it wasn’t a true reflection. We feel we’re probably approaching that this year. The reserves are a huge part of it, that has brought the standard up – we’re playing 15 on 15 on a Tuesday night and that lifts the standard of training and everything else comes from that.

“I give huge credit to the players – every club, at the start of the year, says they are going to step up but it’s a lot harder to do it and we have done that.”

The obvious question is how this potent Knockbride side have taken so long to reach the junior showpiece. In recent years, the standard in the grade has been exceptional and McCabe points out that they have been very close in other seasons.

“Well, with respect and I’m about to talk about before my time there, they have never been beaten by poor teams. Killinkere, Templeport, Denn... Killinkere went to the semi-final and lost in extra time in Ulster, Templeport won the final, there was no Ulster that year, Denn won the final and won Ulster.

“Drumlane beat us, we let that one slip last year, and went on to be beaten on penalties in the Ulster final and Arva beat us, Arva are the team they are, so they weren’t beaten by anyone, quote-unquote, they ‘shouldn’t’ have been. They were all good teams. And they were all 50-50 games, very competitive games, and they have just come out the wrong side of it.

“So while they absolutely could have won any one of those games, I don’t think there’s any shame attached or ‘why are they still junior?’… You know, it just came down to one close game and they were the wrong side of it.”

The Cootehill Celtic clubman took the decision to enter the team in the Ulster League and it paid off.

“Just to get a good start to the year, just to get competitive football. Sometimes you go on the challenge match circuit and you play a team and they’re trying to get something different out of it. I remember last year, I was at a Confirmation and made about 20 phone calls trying to get matches. We ended up getting one but it wasn’t what we were looking for.

“It was four matches, two home, two away, against different opposition so no baggage attached, you weren’t playing anyone you knew. Then, they were competitive, they weren’t just challenge matches. And then there was a semi-final and a final there and I just thought to myself, why wouldn’t we go and try to win that and get the year off to a good start. And that’s the way it turned out.”

It's no surprise to anyone who has watched the competition that Knockbride and Arva will meet at the business end.

“From the minute Ryan Connolly put that ball over the bar last year, Arva were going to be favourites for this year’s Junior Championship so we knew if we were going to do what we wanted to do, we were going to have to cross swords with them at some stage.

“Having said that, we finished seventh last year in the table with score difference and everything. Our main goal at the start of it was win our four games, finish top, get a good score for and we did all that. A coin toss put us then into second but we were happy with what we achieved.

“Then it was play whoever we were going to play, whether that be Arva in a semi-final or a final, there was no point thinking about that, ‘when are we playing Arva?’ if we were playing Drung that day… that wouldn’t have been too clever.

“You knew you were going to play them, all things considered, you would have had a wee eye on them but you had to make sure there were no slip-ups.”

McCabe heaps praise on his players who, he says, have set the standards.

“It’s not even buy-in, you need them pulling you along. Thirty, 35, 37 maybe boys going in the one direction is far better than one or two men at the top of the room saying ‘come on, follow me’. They lead and maybe you follow. We’ve had a good year so far but this is really the measure of the year.

“We’ve had a very good year so far, I don’t want to delve into clichés but we are going to be underdogs.

They’re about as good a junior team as maybe ever played this competition, three inter-county senior footballers. There is a little bit of pressure attached to that I suppose, they don’t want to lose two junior finals in a row but that’s not really in our control.

“We know what we’re about, we know what we have to do. They have five or six boys that we’ll have to watch and watch closely and maybe we have one or two that they might have to keep an eye on and we’ll go about our business as best as we can next week.”