THE Donnelly Vauxhall Tyrone SFC swings into action on Friday with the meeting of Coalisland and Galbally at Healy Park (8.15pm).
The clash of the blues will get the series off to an interesting start, with promoted Galbally fancying their chances of shocking a Na Fianna side still searching for their traditional championship spark. Coalisland last won the O’Neill Cup in 2010 and, last season, reached their first semi-final since that title triumph six-years-ago. They have a mix of youth and experience, with Tyrone panellist Padraig Hampsey and Michael McKernan among promising young defenders capable of making their mark.
Experienced pair Plunkett Kane and Stephen McNally are key figures in a Coalisland side, who will look to Dermot Thornton and Cormac O’Hagan for scores. The Pearse’s have some exciting young prospects, none more so than Christopher Morris, who has been turning in some outstanding performances in the league.
Liam Rafferty is another emerging star who can make a real impact as an attacking half-back, while the experience of Paul Rafferty and Paul Murphy up front will be important to their cause: “Like any year, the aim is to win the championship, but we have a tough start. Galbally have been one of our bogey teams for a while and, looking at their results lately, they’re ready for it,” said Coalisland stalwart and former Tyrone player Plunkett Kane.
“They beat Carrickmore and ran Clonoe close and ran Errigal close. We know that we’re up for a tough game, but we think we’re ready for it as well. They have always given us a tough game and the dangerous thing about championship football is that anything can happen over 60-65 minutes. But we obviously know what we’re in for with Galbally. It’s going to be a big game and hopefully we’ll come out on the right side of it.”
Kane is encouraged by the fact the Coalisland men have seen improvement in their league form following a shaky start to the Division One campaign: “The league has been hit and miss,” he said.
“It took us a while to find our feet. We had a heavy defeat early on by Errigal but, since that, we knuckled down, got a few players back from injury and we’re starting to go well. Championship is the main one, but we want to keep competitive in the league and push on and maybe get into the top-four play-offs as well.”
But they will have to go into battle without star attacker Paddy McNeice. The former Tyrone forward is currently in the United States: “He’s going to be a big miss for us. You take a star forward out of any team and he’s hard to replace,” said Kane.
“We have had to work new formations and tactics to try and work around that, but we still have a fairly good squad there.”
Last season, Coalisland reached the semi-final for the first time since their title triumph in 2010 and Kane is hoping to at least match that performance in the weeks ahead: “Last year, we started off well, getting through the first round and quarter-final, but we came up short against a very good Trillick team that played better on the day and deserved to win,” he said.
The winners of Friday evening’s clash will face either Kildress or Augher in the quarter-finals.
