Cashel crew ‘pure thrilled’ as they make history in Kerry and reach the Munster final

A roar went up in the stand and the faithful Cashel King Cormacs supporters began to sing at full time as they had made the Munster final.

On the field the manager and backroom team for Cashel were quickly on to the field to share in the triumph.

“We are on a journey at the moment and the team are mad to go further,” said the team manager TJ Connolly at full time.

“The players are driving this since the county final and we are giving the Cashel people, the families and my own mother as well as everyone else’s mothers and fathers a real lift.

“No matter what happens from here on in we have had a marvellous year and now we find ourselves in a Munster final which we go back and prepare for in two weeks time,” the King Cormacs manager said.

While they have had Junior B success that was duly celebrated in recent years it has been decades since senior success for the club and TJ Connolly reflected on that saying it was in 1991 that they last played in a provincial senior final at Mitchelstown against Midleton.

They were quality opponents as TJ says: “John Fenton, Pat Hartnett, John Hartnett, Ger Fitzgerald and Kevin Hennessy; they had a star studded team but Cashel had a fair team that day too.”

Cashel stayed over in Kerry the night before this intermediate game rather than travelling down over two hours for an early throw in.

TJ praised the chairman Seanie O'Donoghue and all who gave the panel what was needed: “Our club backed us to the hilt. We appreciate all our sponsors and we hope we give them back every way we can.”

Cashel half back and captain James Cummins was the Clubber TV player of the match and he reflected at full time on the win which he says was hard earned: “a big difference than three or four weeks ago when you had pristine fields although the Abbeydorney field is a credit to them, it is wicked tough on the legs and the body in those conditions,” he said before adding that it was really close game.

“We don’t do it the easy way but we know we have the inventory here that if we stay with it the gaps will open up for Davy McGrath, Oisin, Devon Ryan and you have seen that they are exceptional players,” the captain said.

King Cormacs Chairman Seanie O’Donoghue coached many of the players as juveniles and after a decade long stint as juvenile chair stepped up as the main club chair.

He said the trip was a joyous occasion: “It was going to be a tough ask and it lived up to that. We brought on our bench and it made all the difference. We are very happy now going into a Munster intermediate final in two weeks time.”

Seanie pointed out the magnificent support Cashel had in Kerry: “I’d like to say thanks a million to all of those people who travelled.

“I’d say there is at least five or six hundred here who came down today and yesterday,” he said.

The final beckons for them now.