St Kevins' bid for a return to intermediate football took them as far as the 2005 Louth JFC final, wherein they were pipped by a mere point. Top scorer in the JFC, Liam Boylan is confident the Philipstown men are good enough to escape junior ranks at the third attempt in '06. In fairness to St Kevins, they could hardly have come closer to capturing the 2005 Louth junior football championship. The Red & Blacks eliminated competition favourites Sean McDermotts at the semi-final stage to deservedly book their place in the JFC decider. Therein, they faced Dowdallshill at Castlebellingham on Sunday October 9. Both clubs had been beset by tragedy during the year and were therefore highly motivated in their bid to land the Christy Bellew Cup. As it turned out, the Dundalk side prevailed after making a better start, leading by 1-2 to 0-1 after 14 minutes. Though the Kevins performed admirably in the remaining three quarters and actually led in the closing stages, they never quite managed to salvage the situation, falling to a narrow 1-8 to 0-10 defeat. It was disappointing. As the championship spoils eluded St Kevins, so too did their last chance of booking a return to the middle grade. A rather sluggish start to their league campaign meant that the Philipstown men languished in the wake of Sean McDermotts and John Mitchells on the Division Three table and it was these two neighbours who went on to battle it out for the second promotion spot. With a haul of 3-28 (including seven points in the county final), Liam Boylan finished the year as top scorer in the JFC. Reflecting on the '05 campaign, the skilful Kevins attacker concedes that the Philipstown men played all their best stuff in the championship after losing some ground early on in Division Three: "The objective was to go back up to intermediate football and training went very well at the start of the year. However, we never really got our full team together until championship time and it was in the championship that we showed our best form. I suppose one of our main aims for 2006 has to be to try and reproduce that kind of form on a regular basis in all competitions." Though the Kevins could hardly stand accused of setting the world on fire early on, there were mitigating circumstances. A number of players were unavailable due to injury, while others were on their travels, some as far afield as Australia. "The injuries cleared up and we had our full squad for the championship," Liam notes. "We played some good football in the championship, even in the final, and it's disappointing not to have something to show for it." The Kevins were in Group A of the 2005 JFC, the four-team section, and kicked off their championship programme with a narrow defeat to Dowdallshill (0-12 to 2-4), before following up with successive victories over Annaghminnon Rovers (2-15 to 1-6) and Wolfe Tones (4-16 to 1-6). This was enough to secure a semi-final place against Group B winners Sean McDermotts. The Seans had thumped John Mitchells in a group play-off the previous weekend and went into the semi-final as favourites on the back of that emphatic victory, but the Kevins were having none of that and claimed a deserved 1-7 to 0-7 success at Ardee on Saturday October 1. Trailing by 0-5 to 0-3 at the interval, St Kevins produced a rousing second-half display and took control of the match with 20 minutes remaining. Unfortunately, they only had eight days to prepare for the county final against Dowdallshill in the Grove. The match provided the Philipstown crew with a perfect chance to avenge their opening round defeat to the same opposition. They recorded too many wides from scoreable positions, however, and a poor start as well as a scoreless last 14 minutes cost them dearly. Everyone associated with St Kevins received a stunning blow during the year with the tragic passing of Irene Boylan following an accident. The Boylan family is synonymous with the club and the tragedy affected the team and the community deeply. Under the circumstances, St Kevins' opening round championship defeat to Dowdallshill shortly afterwards was no major surprise. Liam Boylan, who is Irene's cousin, recalls: "We're a very close team and a lot of us are related - we wanted to do something in memory of Irene this year. We lost to Dowdallshill on a bad evening in Dundalk, but the lads really wanted to come back and win a championship for Irene's family. "We beat Annaghminnon with our best performance of the year in our second championship match and we then beat Wolfe Tones, who were already out of it, to go through to the semi-final. "The Annaghminnon game was a big one because they had won their first match against Wolfe Tones, so it was more or less a straight knockout game and we played well on the night." Niall Treadwell and Jeffrey Meehan were back from Australia to play in the semi-final, where St Kevins put one over on Sean McDermotts, who were fancied in most quarters to go all the way. Even though the Seans had definitely emerged from a more difficult group, the Kevins approached the semi-final in confident mood: "A lot of people thought we would lose but we felt ourselves that we had the beating of them. They had beaten us in an intermediate semi-final with a last-minute goal at the same pitch four years earlier and that was in the back of our minds. We still had a lot of lads who had played in an intermediate final [in 2000] as well as three semi-finals and we consider ourselves an intermediate level team. We were always confident we could beat the Seans and it was good to get through to the junior final." Which is exactly what the Kevins had been aiming for from the start of the year! "We felt we could have gone up the previous year, when we lost to the Mochtas, and our aim this time was to get to the final. Obviously, once we got there, we wanted to win it. The early goal didn't help and I was guilty of missing some easy enough frees myself. We had the strong wind in the first half and the goal left us two behind, with a lot of work to do to get back in front. We were three up before half time but we conceded a costly point late in the first half, which left it far too close for comfort. If we'd taken our chances, we could easily have led by six at the break, but the two-point advantage wasn't enough." Having knocked so loudly on the door of senior football around the turn of the millennium, St Kevins have now been junior for two years. Any sign of panic setting in? "We'd be hoping the County Board will do something about the structure of junior football. Playing the same six teams over and over all year doesn't help. We know we can compete at intermediate level … if junior football was more competitive, it might sharpen us up a bit. When you slip down, you lose some lads, as the football is no longer as attractive. We have to start winning our league matches. If we get on a run, we can turn it around." A regular on the team for the past eight years, Liam Boylan has now suffered the disappointment of two county championship final defeats (he was also on the side beaten by Dreadnots in the 2000 intermediate decider). Comparing both, he says: "This year's final defeat hurt more. At this point, you start to feel that you aren't going to get too many more chances. But the hunger is still there to win a championship and hopefully we can do it in 2006." Tom Boylan looked after team affairs in 2005, in conjunction with John and Billy Boylan. Regarding Tom, who is his uncle, Liam states: "He has brought on a lot of young lads and has managed to entice some lads who weren't playing any football. He also has a group of 16-year-olds who will be breaking onto the team soon. David Smith and Andrew Campbell are two young players who spring to mind. Tom has done a good job maturing the team and we're all very grateful." Finally, what's the target for 2006? "It's important to start the year well. We also need to place as much emphasis on the league as on the championship. If we do that, we should be close. If we had picked up more points early on, we could have been in contention for promotion going into the last few games in the league. We'll aim for more consistency. "There's no point going all out for the championship at the expense of the league. Anything can happen in the championship. We lost the final in 2005 even though we played well. The priority next year has to be promotion - one way or another." St Kevins, 2005 Louth junior football championship finalists: Bernard Wogan; Derek Flanagan, Jeffrey Meehan, Patrick Gregory; Alan Gregory, James Boylan, Paudie Boylan; Niall Treadwell 0-1, Gareth Boylan; David Stokes, Matthew Boylan, Michael Grogan 0-2; Liam Boylan 0-7, Mark Boylan, Brian O'Neill. Sub: Paddy Matthews Tweet

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