January is set to be a busy month for Down and Ronan Sheehan as competitive hurling action returns in the form of the McGurk Cup and the Kehoe Cup, which is the Leinster equivalent. The Mourne men have entered both competitions and will have two games next weekend.
They await the winners of Queen's and Louth in the quarter-final of the McGurk Cup while they take on Meath in their first game of the group stages in the Kehoe Cup, where they’ll also play Carlow, Kildare and Wicklow.
Down manager Sheehan suggests his side will use the Ulster competition to bleed in some fresh faces to the team and get as many minutes into some of the newbies as they can.
“We’ll be using to McGurk Cup to give an opportunity for some of our younger lads to get games and to introduce them to senior inter-county hurling. We’re looking forward to it,” said the Down boss.
“If we end up playing Queen's, we’ll probably have to play a few more of our more seasoned players simply because a number of our younger lads are actually at Queen's. Queen's have first call on them and we’ll allow them to play for Queen's.
“Outside of that we’ll be using the McGurk Cup as much as possible to introduce our new faces and to give some of our younger players game time.
“In many cases, we’ll be playing maybe on a Saturday in the McGurk Cup and a Sunday with the Kehoe Cup. We’ll just be using our panel to give every player as many games as we possibly can.”
Down are the current holders of the McGurk Cup, but Sheehan insists they are more interested in developing their squad rather than defending their title.
“It’s a useful preseason tournament but at the same time that’s what it is. It isn’t the kind of tournament that’d we’d say we’re going to go all out to win.
“We’ve won it twice in the last four years but it’s not a competition we would approach saying ‘we want to win the McGurk Cup.’ Our views on the McGurk Cup are very much to get as many games as you can and get as much game time as you can for your panel.
“Games are far, far better than training. Even preseason competitive games are better than challenge matches. The more games you can get in the McGurk Cup the better preparation it is,” added Sheehan.
There are a number of new recruits added to the Down panel for the upcoming season, where they’ll once again compete in Division 2A and the Joe McDonagh Cup, and Sheehan is hoping to give them all some competitive minutes.
“We have a lot of young lads there. We’ve got a number of our u-20s on board like Tom McGrattan and Pearse Smyth, Cathal Lavery, Stuart Martin is involved this year as well.
“Then we’ve got the likes of Ayrton Gleeson from Ballycran, Ayrton’s a Carlow man that’s now living in Saul and playing for Ballycran. He’s on board this year and we’ll be hoping to get him a bit of game time as well.
“Then you have some of your younger lads there like Niall McFarlane, Sean Hughes, Sean Campbell, they’re all at Queen's but once Queen's are out, we’d be hoping to get them a few games.
“There’s probably eight, nine, ten lads there, Jason Cosgrove would be another one, we’ll be hoping to get a bit of game time for them in the McGurk Cup.”
