The Killinkere club received a huge honour in 2001 when their exciting young attacker James Clarke was named Cavan Minor Footballer of the Year. Clarke's form in the county jersey against both Down and Monaghan in the championship was nothing short of a revelation and he is sure to feature prominently for both club and county for many years to come. Looking back on the events of 2001 from a personal perspective, James Clarke admits he was particularly pleased with how things worked out at intercounty level. The Killinkere clubman was prominent in the Breffni County's Ulster MFC campaign and was officially named as the best under 18 footballer in the county for his troubles. "It was definitely a great year from a personal point of view," he says. "At the beginning of the year I wasn't even sure of getting a place on the starting team and it looked dodgy for a while. I was delighted just to get a start in the championship and fortunately everything just worked out well for me on the day against Down and it took off from there." Cavan were widely regarded as underdogs ahead of their first round meeting with Down in Casement Park. The Mourne County boasted a much stronger recent pedigree at this level and were expected to see off the challenge of the lads in blue. But Cavan had other ideas... They travelled across the border and recorded a comfortable victory. This set them up for a provincial semi-final with neighbours and deadly rivals Monaghan. Not surprisingly, the Breffni boys went in to this one as favourites. But it didn't go according to plan. "We went into the Monaghan game full of confidence, having beaten Down in Casement Park," notes James, who as part of the tactics employed by the management team (Brendan Nelligan, Robbie O'Connell and Seamus McCabe) was named as a half forward but actually played as a roving full forward. "At the start of the year, it would be fair to say that we were pretty nervous. We didn't know what to expect. When we trained on the Wednesday night before the first round everyone was talking about 'doing their best' and they were saying we were the best team so we'd win. But these are the kind of things people say anyway and I'm not so sure that we were that confident. "Prior to the championship, Down gave Meath a real hiding and we had only managed to beat Meath by a couple of points, so the fear was that they were an excellent side and that they might prove too strong for us. I remember thinking when they went a couple of points clear early on that there was a real danger of us getting hammered. "But the lads kept going and refused to let the heads drop and we got the reward we deserved. We got two goals in the first half from Sean Brady and Sean Maguire and they gave us a lead which we never relinquished. We never looked back after that." Whatever the Cavan lads might have been expecting, they certainly weren't anticipating such a comfortable passage to the last four: "We thought Down would be a really difficult hurdle to cross because they'd done better than us in the Ulster minor league and they won the All-Ireland in 1999. They also had a couple of lads on the Irish U17 team for the international rules series and everybody was talking about them. We were delighted with the win." Disappointment followed hot on the heels of satisfaction. "The Monaghan game was something like four weeks later and we trained hard for the first two weeks, with lots of sprints and running. Then we took it easy enough for the next two weeks and concentrated more on ballwork. It was a sensible approach but complacency set in and some of the players started to believe the hype. "We were flying for the first 15 minutes against Monaghan and were well ahead but from there on it all went dramatically downhill. They put some good scoring runs together in the second half and we only managed two points after the break, which just isn't good enough. By the time we realised we were in trouble, it was too late - we were beaten. "It's difficult to see exactly where we went wrong. We were probably too complacent and overly-confident and listening to our own hype, which is no way to go into any match. We were very disappointed afterwards because we'd really expected to get to the final against Tyrone. We had played Monaghan three times prior to the championship and had beaten them convincingly on each occasion. "They deployed very negative tactics on the day and we weren't prepared for that and had no answer. The referee was very poor and he let them away with some very heavy tackling. There were a couple of occasions when another ref might well have produced the red card. To a certain extent, we only have ourselves to blame, though, because we didn't play the ref. Once we saw that he was letting things go, we should have played a more physical game ourselves..." James was thrilled when he was named Cavan Minor Footballer of the Year, although he modestly admits he wasn't expecting such an accolade: "To be honest, I thought it was between myself, Sean Maguire and Fergal Brady but I didn't expect to get it. Sean was a tower of strength at midfield all year. He played in every game and was excellent every time. He steadied the team and was very influential and I'd definitely have picked him. Fergal was the team captain and was also excellent at full back. He played corner back with the Gaels all year and is another who was really influential with the county minors." At club level, it was a quiet year for Killinkere, culminating in relegation to Division Two, much to the disappointment of everyone involved. Hardly a remarkable first full year on the starting fifteen for James Clarke: "It was a disappointing year," James admits. "There was a lot of optimism when Brendan Clarke took over the team. Brendan had a good track record, having done well with our underage teams and he also coached the school team in Bailieborough. "We got off to a great start with wins over Gowna and Mullahoran, but didn't win another game in the league all year. We had to win our last game to stay up and were four points up with five minutes left but ended up losing by a point, which was a real blow." The senior championship didn't go much better but this time, despite again flirting with demotion, Killinkere avoided the drop: "We lost to Crosserlough, drew with Kingscourt and beat Ballymachugh. The way it worked out, we knew going into the last round that we could have ended up in either a relegation play-off or the quarter-finals depending on our own result and the Kingscourt/Crosserlough game." As it transpired, Killinkere did neither, even though victory over Ballymac' guaranteed safety. "In 2000, we drew with Belturbet and the Gaels and reached the quarter-finals. To get back to the knock-out stages again would have been an achievement and we were disappointed not to go that far. But Gavin and Declan [Fitzsimons] were missing for most of the year and that was a big setback . . . I'm certain we'd have beaten Crosserlough in Breffni if they'd been playing." Still, James has no doubt whatsoever that Killinkere are a much better team than their 2001 form suggests: "I reckon we're definitely a first division side, but we just didn't get our act together. Things gradually fell apart during the year. We got stuck in a rut and when we started losing games lads began to miss training and the attitude probably wasn't all that it should have been. Ultimately, we probably got what we deserved. "Next year is going to be a big struggle and we're going to have to knuckle down from the word go. "Three years ago, we won the minor league, beating Cavan Gaels in the semi-final and Crosserlough in the final and that team is all coming through now, so we have the players. "This year, we simply have to get back up to Division One . . . and if we could get a good run in the league then our confidence would be up for the championship and hopefully we could make the knock-out stages." James is studying PE and Maths at University Limerick, a career choice which supplements his football perfectly. His is a name for the future. He'll be with the Cavan U21s for the next three years and will almost certainly wear the blue jersey at senior level in the not-too-distant future. His younger brother Tommy Michael represented the Cavan U16s last year and is on the minor panel this year - even more reason for Killinkere to be optimistic about their future. The Ladies game Killinkere's Ladies football team has been in existence now for almost five years, the setting up of a football team is no small task. Rounding up players, coaches, and officers is just the tip of the iceberg, fundraising is no small task, and costs rise yearly, a huge thank you is recorded to the officers, coaches sponsor's and helper's who give of their time voluntarily year in and year out to put the show on the road. Killinkere LGFC has developed through these years from fielding one team, to the point where we now present three teams for competition, U12, U14 and Junior. Indeed our U14 side progressed to the play off stages in this year's championship and produced a standard of football, which made us proud. The future looks bright, the players are plentiful at under age level, we hope that this trend continues into the years ahead, these young women are the hope of Ladies football in Killinkere and if they continue to prepare and train in the skills of discipline of LGF who knows what they can achieve, our hopes and ambitions lie with them. LGF has come a long way, there are 78,000 registered members, 74,000 of whom are playing members, this year's final between Mayo and Laois who broad cast live on TNG and over 25,000 spectators attended the game in Croke Park, which leads me to an area I feel very strongly about. LGF must work towards forging an alliance with the GAA, I feel this is necessary if LGF is to flourish as it should, it would leave life much simpler, the most pressing example is in acquiring the use of pitches for League and County finals. I was amazed to read that the ladies association paid £20,000 in the year 2000 for the privilege of playing the Ladies All-Ireland Final in Croke Park. The GAA's request for around £30,000 in 2001 lead the committee to make a stand. They decided to take their final's elsewhere the GAA later reversed their decision and the games went ahead in Croke Park. In our own county the County Board were not as magnanimous and sadly the Cavan's Ladies County Final was not held in Breffni Park. Wouldn't it be wonderful to see ladies finals used as curtain raisers for men's national league or championship games. I suppose until we unite and fill Croke Park on ladies final day and the tills of the GAA tot up the profitable link, it may well remain a distant dream. But there is no doubt LGF is not going to go away, in my opinion each year it grows in stature, thanks mainly to the dedication of the ladies themselves, who do not have things laid on for them in the way the fellows do, the standard of football played in equal to, and in some instances better than, that played on any County Male GAA team. As the words of the song say, "The only way is up" this definitely applies to LGF. Tweet

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