It’s winner takes all in Crossmaglen this weekend as Cavan champions Castlerahan meet Monaghan’s Corduff with a chance to reach the Ulster Intermediate Championship final up for grabs.
The last couple of years have been quite a rollercoaster ride for the Breffni men, who claimed their first ever Cavan senior title in 2018 before going on to double that success the following season.
Their provincial runs were short lived however with defeats coming in both years, to Eoghan Rua of Derry in 2018 and Donegal’s Naomh Conaill in 2019.
Fast forward to 2022 and Brian Donohoe’s men are back on the provincial scene, this time in the Intermediate grade and are sixty minutes away from a decider.
Cavan clubs haven’t faired too well in the Ulster Intermediate Championship, appearing in the final just four times with Ballinagh the only team to have actually won the competition back in 2007.
Castlerahan fought off Fermanagh’s Devenish in the quarter-final with three late points from top scorer Cormac Daly (2) and Padraig McGahern securing a 0-13 to 0-10 victory.
That triumph extended Castlerahan’s unbeaten championship run to nine on the trot, with two draws against Cuchulainns (one in the group and one in the semi-final) in the Cavan championship the only blots on their record.
Sunday’s opponents will offer a new and fresh challenge and Corduff, led by former Monaghan manager Seamus McEnaney, have two solid wins under their belts.
‘Banty’s’ side scraped past Shane O’Neill’s in the preliminary round with one-point the difference in a game that looked dead and buried at half time.
Jordan McGarrell’s second half goal gave the Monaghan men some comfort but a spirited fightback from the Armagh side left a nail-biting finish.
McGarrell repeated the feat the last day out against Danny Hughes’ Saval, as Corduff proved too strong on the night and ran out 11-point victors in an ill-tempered affair.
Bustling full forward Keith McEnaney and free taker Fergal Hanratty are the main scoring threats to the Castlerahan goal and they’ll need close attention.
For the Breffni men, they have a much wider spread of scores if their quarter final clash is anything to go by. Of their 13 points that night, nine different players got their names on the scoresheet.
This one certainly won’t be a free-flowing game of football and if Corduff gain the upper hand in the physical stakes, which they thrive on, they should get over the line.
