Offaly Club Hurling 2026

[faithfulfanatic]

Bad weekend for clareen with all 3 teams getting beaten. They are going with a young team at senior B which is fair enough as the older lads can't go on for ever. That lack of experience or older heads so to speak probably cost them in the last 10 minutes on Saturday.

Clareen started 5 lads who are 30 or over and brought on another who is over 40

[frankthetank]

Belmont have a truly remarkable record over the last decade. 7 semi final defeats. The other 3 were group stage knockouts.

2017 - Lost SF to KK by 1 point
2018 - Lost SF to Coolderry by 1 point
2019 - Lost SF to Rynaghs by 2 points
2020 - Lost SF to KK by 4 points
2022 - Lost SF to Shinrone by 1 point
2025 - Lost SF to Shinrone by 8 points
2026 - Lost SF to Ballinamere by 2 points

It becomes all the more remarkable when you consider the fact a lot of these same players have also lost 5 finals and 3 semis over the same period for Ferbane.

2022 was the fcuk up to end all fcuk ups.

[Gobbler]

Bad weekend for clareen with all 3 teams getting beaten. They are going with a young team at senior B which is fair enough as the older lads can't go on for ever. That lack of experience or older heads so to speak probably cost them in the last 10 minutes on Saturday.

Clareen started 5 lads who are 30 or over and brought on another who is over 40

Think Kevin Corrigan made the point after the intermediate final that Clareen probably shot themselves a bit in the foot. They were caught between stools. I think they would certainly would of won the senior B with even 1 or two of the stronger intermediate players coming in as subs in second half. Fair play to them getting to these finals and with a small pick. Quiet similar to Rhode in many way. Getting the max out of their community. They won the division 1 league title this year beating coolderry so they certainly were good enough to win that Senior B.

Probably the biggest shock of weekend and was great to see was Gracefield. They beat a stacked coolderry team. I know it was lads that are old enough now but go through that team and subs and coolderry had some amount of experience. Plenty of lads with senior county medals and intercounty hurlers. And those lads involved are die hard coolderry hurling men. None of them carry weight or in bad shape. Id say they rounded up a good crew and said they would win that junior B. But gracefield didnt read the script and proved they have plenty of hurling in them too. They have been knocking on door of junior B going back 15 or 16 years now and finally got there. Well done to them.

[faithfulfanatic]

Bad weekend for clareen with all 3 teams getting beaten. They are going with a young team at senior B which is fair enough as the older lads can't go on for ever. That lack of experience or older heads so to speak probably cost them in the last 10 minutes on Saturday.

Clareen started 5 lads who are 30 or over and brought on another who is over 40

Think Kevin Corrigan made the point after the intermediate final that Clareen probably shot themselves a bit in the foot. They were caught between stools. I think they would certainly would of won the senior B with even 1 or two of the stronger intermediate players coming in as subs in second half. Fair play to them getting to these finals and with a small pick. Quiet similar to Rhode in many way. Getting the max out of their community. They won the division 1 league title this year beating coolderry so they certainly were good enough to win that Senior B.

Probably the biggest shock of weekend and was great to see was Gracefield. They beat a stacked coolderry team. I know it was lads that are old enough now but go through that team and subs and coolderry had some amount of experience. Plenty of lads with senior county medals and intercounty hurlers. And those lads involved are die hard coolderry hurling men. None of them carry weight or in bad shape. Id say they rounded up a good crew and said they would win that junior B. But gracefield didnt read the script and proved they have plenty of hurling in them too. They have been knocking on door of junior B going back 15 or 16 years now and finally got there. Well done to them.

Agreed, fair play to Gracefield.
Plenty of our junior Bs good enough to hurl intermediate.

Final thrown away 2 years in a row after giving up a 7 point lead to Rynaghs last year.

I understand that Gracefield have some senior footballers from Bracknagh hurling, along with some lads from Walsh Island and elsewhere. There also may be a couple from the Portarlington side who have moved into the area, have no affiliation to Portarlington and were from a hurling background.
Most of the team are young enough and have hurled all up along with Gracefield.
Does anyone know the breakdown of clubs involved and the split between going to Gracefield or Edenderry to hurl?

They have had some decent underage teams and it's all about having an adult team operating at a decent level to nurture them when they reach that age.
They've also had a few on Offaly underage sides - the 5 year plan should be to gain intermediate status and consolidate it, which would hopefully ensure that a county level player would stay with the club and not look to transfer elsewhere.

[uibhfhaili72]

Seir Kieran unfortunately losers not their weekend. They wont take moral victories given their strong tradition but given the size of the area and given that this is by no means a team of club hall of famers they should hold their heads up.
Many others could take a leaf out of their book.
Not to be pointing fingers but cases like Crinkle, Ballyskenagh Killavilla ,Edenderry, Gracefield and Shamrocks even with their wins.Not everyone can be Senior but being competitive with 2 adult teams should be the aim of most.
Clareen maintain bang for their buck everytime and seem to be topping it up slowly but regularly. Well Done to them hold the heads high.

[Dodge83]

I could be completely wrong but did Gracefield not operate at Junior A level in the last 15 years?

[frankthetank]

I could be completely wrong but did Gracefield not operate at Junior A level in the last 15 years?

They absolutley did. Regularly in fact.

[frankthetank]

Some averages ahead of the county final to see how they compare:

K/K average goals per game scored: 1.0
Ballinamere avearge goals per game: 1.6

K/K average points per game scored: 22.4
Ballinamere average points per game scored: 22.2

K/K average goals per game conceded: 1.4
Ballinamere goals per game conceded: 1.5

K/K average points per game conceded: 21.6
Ballinamere average points per game conceded: 18.6

In the interests of fairness I used the score at the end of regulation time in the K/K vs St Rynaghs semi-final.

Ballinamere statistically with the upper hand. The goals scored and points conceded averages show a noteworthy gap between the teams. The absence of Charlie Mitchell and a James Gorman type figure at 14 seem to have blunted K/K's goal scoring edge. Even their goal at the weekend was just a calamitous error from Conor Clancy. If Clancy just caught that ball K/K would be operating at 0.5 goals per game over their last 4 games.

Promises to a great game. The final of 2024 while low on scoring by current standards was extremely high on quality. Even taking the poor weather into account.

[first_touch]

Belmont have a truly remarkable record over the last decade. 7 semi final defeats. The other 3 were group stage knockouts.

2017 - Lost SF to KK by 1 point
2018 - Lost SF to Coolderry by 1 point
2019 - Lost SF to Rynaghs by 2 points
2020 - Lost SF to KK by 4 points
2022 - Lost SF to Shinrone by 1 point
2025 - Lost SF to Shinrone by 8 points
2026 - Lost SF to Ballinamere by 2 points

It becomes all the more remarkable when you consider the fact a lot of these same players have also lost 5 finals and 3 semis over the same period for Ferbane.

Yes it's truly remarkable that these lads keep coming back year after year in both codes, coming so agonisingly close to victory. They are a credit to themselves, their family and their parish.

Eight of yesterday's starting team started the football semi final with Ferbane the previous Sunday and two more came on as subs. In total, there are 16 players on both panels (13 of whom have seen game time at senior level in both codes in recent weeks and two others played intermediate football where Ferbane reached the semi final).

They remind me a bit of Mayo who came so close on several occasions. One key element that helped Mayo get over the line this year was having an excellent sports psychologist. There's no doubt that Belmont are good enough to at least reach a county final. But it's hard to break through that psychological barrier when history keeps repeating itself.

Hopefully Ferbane will have better luck next weekend!

[G91]

At some stage the dual club would have to come into focus there’s no denying it’s playing a part Tullamore had both hurling and football and are competing at senior b aswell and there hurlers are gone

Shamrocks likewise

Ferbane intermediate semi final , junior A hurling quater Belmont , semi final senior football , semi final hurling the following week

At some stage these games do take a toll and Belmont had thier chances but it wouldn’t have been easy for those players

Durrow were done and dusted in the football plus you could make the argument top your group and you have the rest you need

[Dodge83]

At some stage the dual club would have to come into focus there’s no denying it’s playing a part Tullamore had both hurling and football and are competing at senior b aswell and there hurlers are gone

Shamrocks likewise

Ferbane intermediate semi final , junior A hurling quater Belmont , semi final senior football , semi final hurling the following week

At some stage these games do take a toll and Belmont had thier chances but it wouldn’t have been easy for those players

Durrow were done and dusted in the football plus you could make the argument top your group and you have the rest you need

Tullamore junior hurlers are in a county final