The 2004 season never quite took off for Kilkerley Emmets, but Colin McGuinness flew the blue and yellow flag high by figuring on the county senior panel all season. Wee County 2004 talks to the Kilkerley and Louth midfielder about the events of '04. While it will hardly be remembered as the greatest year they've ever had, Kilkerley Emmets can nonetheless look back on 2004 with a degree of satisfaction. They enjoyed a terrific championship victory over O'Connells and swapped punches manfully in an absorbing Division 1B contest. Kilkerley also supplied Val Andrews' new-look Louth senior squad with 24-year-old midfielder Colin McGuinness, who has been a mainstay of the club's first team for eight seasons already. Colin started the national football league games against Kildare and Down and gained vital experience training with the county team all year. Though disappointed that Kilkerley failed to make an impression in 2004, the player is hopeful that the club is heading in the right direction and believes Kilkerley will be able to hold their own against the best of the rest in the Wee County in coming seasons - especially once they have their full complement available. For a variety of reasons, Kilkerley's challenge just never got off the ground in '04. Some key men were unavailable at different stages during the year and the Emmets were frustrated as they could never quite get their best team out. They were second from bottom of Division 1B at the halfway stage in the league programme, leaving themselves with plenty of work to do in the latter half of the season if they were to preserve their senior standing. They kept plugging away manfully, however, and survived at the end of a long hard battle, albeit by the skin of their teeth! Meanwhile, in the championship, Emmets were drawn in Group D, where O'Connells, St Marys and St Josephs provided the opposition. Looking at the group, Kilkerley had every right to be confident of advancing to the knock-out stages, though it was never going to be easy. They started their campaign in tremendous fashion with a 2-9 to 2-6 defeat of senior newcomers O'Connells at Ardee on May 23. This was a wonderful result against a Castlebellingham-Kilsaran combination that certainly wasn't lacking motivation. On June 20, Kilkerley locked horns with 2003 county finalists St Marys at Dromiskin. They started brightly and gave as good as they got for 50 minutes. However, they lost their way thereafter and conceded a glut of late scores to capitulate on a scoreline of 0-22 to 1-9. Knockbridge was the venue for the final group outing against the Joes. Kilkerley were still in with a chance of forcing a three-way play-off but any such aspirations turned to sandman's dust when the Cluskey Park outfit prevailed by 2-12 to 2-5. That result effectively closed the group out, with the Marys and O'Connells progressing, while it was curtains for St Josephs and Kilkerley. With regard to the championship campaign, Colin comments: "We got off to a good start but things fell apart and didn't go according to plan at all in the end." By winning their first game, Kilkerley had given themselves every chance of progressing. Defeats in the two remaining games were not what the doctor ordered! "O'Connells had Stefan White and Mark Stanfield but we still came out on top, which was a big boost. We thought we'd give it a good go, but we lost our way completely in the last ten minutes against the Marys and we gave a very poor performance in the last game against the Joes. It was disappointing because we know we can do better than that. "The team spirit was high after getting to the knock-out stage of the championship in 2003 and we were hoping we could build on that. We were also hoping to push for a place in Division 1A, but ended up at the wrong end of the Division 1B table. I don't know what happened. We never got going and our league performances weren't great." Though he's still a very young man, Shane Lennon has already emerged as one of the most exciting footballers in the county. The Kilkerley full forward sustained a nasty injury before the start of the season and his long-term absence represented a major blow, as Colin confirms: "Shane had been playing good football and was a big loss. He's a young lad but he's played a lot of football and picked up a few knocks. But we're hoping to have Shane back on the team, fully fit, next year and that would give us all a great lift." Paul Litchfield handled team affairs in 2004, assisted by Willie Quigley and Aidan Crimmins. Colin notes: "Paul came in this year and did a great job. Morale was high, but it just didn't work out properly for us. Sometimes that can happen. We won the first league game against our local rivals Naomh Malachi but then had a couple of narrow defeats to Stabannon and Roche, and things started to go downhill. "Paul got training organised at the beginning of January and, from what I heard back, he did a great job. Unfortunately, I missed most of the training myself due to my involvement with the county team, and some other lads were unavailable because of work and the county U21s. It's hard to get everybody out, but that's no fault of the management and they did everything they could to get things up and running." A former county under 21 himself, Colin was originally called up for trials with the Wee County seniors three years ago but missed out under unlucky circumstances when he broke a leg. Things worked out better, however, when current Louth boss Val Andrews invited the Kilkerley clubman on board: "It was a great experience to be involved. I was involved initially with the North Louth team that won the trials and thankfully Val decided to keep me as part of his panel for the year. He's a very good manager, and a very honest man. I think he's going to do well with the team. "The training was very good and [Andrews' right hand man] Terry Hyland made a big contribution. All in all, it has been a great experience and I'd love to be involved again next year." As well as the league games against Kildare and Down, Colin McGuinness also featured in the well-attended Louth/Monaghan tournament game that marked the official opening of the Mattock Rangers pitch early in the year. In the league, Louth suffered six successive defeats before finally opening their account in the last Division 2B outing against Waterford. They lost to Wexford in the first round in Leinster before beating Antrim in the qualifiers, but Galway then eliminated the Wee County at Parnell Park - a game Louth might well have won. Colin notes: "Val had a complete clear-out and brought in about eight or nine players who were new to intercounty football. I think we showed a massive improvement from the Wexford game to the Galway one and that's encouraging. This was a new team and we had to start somewhere, but things are beginning to work for the team. "We were missing some of our bigger names for long spells and their presence will lift the younger lads next year. We gave Galway a good game and we really could have beaten them, but we missed too many opportunities. We had fourteen wides, but we can learn from that and hopefully put the experience to good use next year. "We should have beaten Westmeath in the O'Byrne Cup in Mullingar and they went on to win Leinster. So we know we're not a million miles away. Val has started something new and hopefully we can continue to learn and move forward. There was nothing expected from Louth in 2004, but I think we can push for promotion to Division One next year." Of course, Colin is a Kilkerley Emmets player first and foremost and the club will be his No.1 priority in 2005. How might we expect them to fare? "We have a young squad and I think it'll come together for us. We may have to put a bit more work in but that won't do anybody any harm. "We won the Division Two league in 2002, after getting relegated the previous year, and we had a good run in the senior championship in 2003. Things never went our way this year but we can turn the corner again. There are a lot of young lads coming along and Paul has brought a good few younger lads into the first-team panel. "Off the field, we hope to have our floodlights up in time for winter training and we're going to do some work on the dug-outs and the car park. The committee is working hard and the club has a good support. So hopefully we'll get a better run at it next year…" Tweet

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