Coulter and Orchard are on a building job

Ask almost any Armagh man if there’s one sporting landmark he could achieve in life, and the answer will almost certainly be to lift the Sam Maguire in his home county’s colours.
Climbing those steps, looking down on a sea of orange and white festooned across the Croke Park pitch. What a feeling, and a dream that came true for Kieran McGeeney and the Armagh side of 2002. Joe Kernan’s men made history, and their achievements will be the stuff or local lore for decades.
A 16-year-old Declan Coulter was stood on Hill 16 that day, proud as punch. He watched with friends, and boy did they celebrate when the final whistle blew and Stevie McDonnell’s 60th minute point had proved enough for the slenderest of victories.
Armagh – champions of Ireland. It doesn’t get much better than that. He and his pals returned home that night to join in the celebrations, and for weeks the county was abuzz with an achievement that was a long time in coming.
Despite this euphoria, however, there has only ever been one game for Declan Coulter. Sunday, September 22, 2002 was a great day, but this is one Armagh man whose mind was always on other things.
In a football-mad county, and despite his past appearances in an Armagh Harps shirt, hurling is – and always was – Coulter’s top priority. One Cuchullain’s clubman described how, even as a small child, young Declan would be on the sidelines with his dad Paul, watching the game, taking it all in.
This continued at St Patrick’s Grammar School, where his second year team became the first in the school’s history to win an A hurling competition when they lifted the McNamee Cup, before going on to add the Casement Cup – the Ulster colleges hurling senior B title – in his last year.
At 21 now, the free-scoring full-forward remains wise beyond his years. Already in his seventh year playing for the Cuchullain’s senior side, headlines have never been his thing. It has been the downfall of many a rising star to let talk go to their head, and he knows it.
Mention the Ulster GAA Writers Player of the Year award he won back in November, and he’s almost embarrassed: “I suppose it’s nice to be recognised,” he says, before changing the subject.
His performances in the latter stages of Armagh’s run to the Nicky Rackard final last year, including a personal haul of 3-8 in the semi-final trouncing of Donegal? “I was happy enough, but anybody can knock a ball over the bar or take a free. It’s about the boys who get the ball to the forwards.”
And herein lies the key to understanding this third year student at St Mary’s in Belfast. Sure, he’d love to lift the Liam McCarthy Cup with Armagh. Even the Christy Ring. But it’s not what drives him. It’s not what makes him travel from his student house on Belfast’s Springfield Road down to Armagh twice a week for county training in the middle of the January cold snap.
He wants to be a teacher, and leaving his mark on Armagh hurling by helping leave a legacy of good practice and raised standards is of great importance. Manager Mattie Lennon, Coulter believes, is the right man to move things forward.

As the man who guided Armagh’s U21 footballers to All-Ireland glory in 2005, Derrynoose native Lennon, with the assistance of former Antrim selector Ger Rogan and fitness coach Julie Davis, has risen to the challenge of galvanising the small ball game in the Orchard county.
“The potential has always been there in Armagh, but it’s a case of getting everybody on the same wavelength. That’s what Mattie has drilled into us since he started,” said Coulter.
“We are really benefiting from his experience, and from the people he has with him. No disrespect to the managers we’ve had before, but he’s brought an added dimension. However, it’s alright the manager taking a professional approach, the players need to weigh in too.
“We know we’re only at the start of something here, and we will only be talked about in the same breath as the [Armagh] footballers when we put in the effort they have put in over the years and actually achieve something.
“The point is, we want to make sure young boys who enjoy hurling keep it on. Maybe seeing us do well in the Nicky Rackard last year, and being in the papers, has encouraged a few more to come to trials. That’s a positive thing.
“If we can keep five or six players out of every U16 or U18 team, then we’ll be doing rightly. It wasn’t so long ago you mightn’t have got any.
“The tide hasn’t turned fully, but things are getting better.”
Since Lennon took charge of the senior team three years ago, hurling in Armagh has undergone a sea change. They emerged from Division Three without losing a game, but were brought down to earth with a bang during last year’s winless Division Two campaign.
They came close against Carlow and Meath, but were well beaten by Wicklow and eventual Division Two winners Laois. Despite this setback, they performed admirably in the Nicky Rackard Cup before losing to Roscommon in the final.
This season, they will face familiar foes in Carlow, Meath and Derry, who narrowly defeated Armagh in the Ulster Championship, while they must also travel to Ballycran to take on Down, as well as hosting 2005 Nicky Rackard champions London.
They may have to do without some of the Keady players, as many are believed to be considering their short-term future with the county in light of their club’s run to the semi-final of the All-Ireland Intermediate Hurling Championship, which ended with a 1-10 to 1-4 at the hands of Clonkill from Westmeath in Ballybay last month.
Add to that the fact that a number of Armagh’s more experienced players, including experienced heads Eddie Fearon, John Joe Sheridan, Terry and Stevie McCann and Declan’s brother Chris have taken a sabbatical, and it would seem to point towards a difficult campaign.
“The games we played in the League last year stood to us when it came to playing in the Nicky Rackard, and hopefully that will be the case with the league this year,” said Coulter.
“We had a couple of good performances last year, but a lack of experience cost us in the end. Against Laois, we were holding them rightly and then we lost concentration for 10 minutes and the game was over. We were the masters of our own downfall in a lot of those games.
“In some cases we probably panicked, and went back to our old habits. Ger wouldn’t be slow in letting you know if you’re doing things the wrong way. He and Mattie are trying to get us focussed on mastering the basics of the game.
“We knew it was going to be tough, and perhaps those couple of heavy defeats were what we needed. We all wanted to be playing at that level. There’s no point hanging about Division Three and beating teams easily. Personally, I found scores a lot harder to come by, but we wanted to make the step up, and we have. It’s never nice to lose, but the onus is on us to prove we can stay there.
“We want to keep improving, and to put Armagh hurling on the map.”