O'Raghallaighs have improved beyond recognition in recent years and proved during the 2003 season that they're now one of the most dangerous intermediate sides in the Wee County. A tower of strength at centre back, Cathal McGinty reviews the team's stellar displays in '03 and assesses their 2004 prospects. O'Raghallaighs are one of the fastest-improving entities in Louth. A few short years ago, the famous Drogheda club was struggling in the nether regions of junior ranks ... now they're knocking on the door of senior football. In 2003, the Hoops proved a force to be reckoned with in the intermediate championship, giving all other challengers plenty to think about. They emerged from the competition's Group of Death and TWICE came close to booking a place in the IFC semi-finals. Due to a fixtures backlog, the league had not been completed at the time of writing ...and the Division 2B table was a congested affair. O'Raghallaighs lay third but weren't out of the woods mathematically. In fact, only two of the division's seven teams were safe from the spectre of relegation. St Mochtas were gone, while any one of Na Piarsaigh, St Nicholas, St Kevins or O'Raghallaighs would join them. It would take an unlikely combination of results to put O'Raghallaighs down, however. They appear to have done enough to preserve their intermediate standing for another year at least. Not a bad year's work by any standards ... and one suspects there's plenty more to come from this exciting young team! Looking back on how things panned out over the course of the '03 season, O'Raghallaighs' trusty centre back Cathal McGinty says the mood in the camp is one of reasonable contentment: "We're pretty happy. I suppose it couldn't really have been much worse than last year, when we had to win our final game to stay up. This time we made a better start in the league and had an extended run in the championship, which is good going compared to 2002. We had two chances of going through to the last four and, even though we're disappointed not to have made it, it was a satisfactory year." By all accounts, O'Raghallaighs have made phenomenal progress. Having survived the aforementioned relegation play-off at the end of '02 (against Westerns), the 2001 junior champions were determined to make a more favourable impression this time around. The result was highly impressive. The Hoops came within a kick of the ball of a place in the IFC semi-finals, narrowly losing (1-12 to 2-8) their final Group B outing to neighbours Oliver Plunketts. Had they won that Drogheda derby, O'Raghallaighs would have topped their group and therefore booked a semi-final berth. As it was, defeat consigned them to a Group B play-off with Naomh Fionnbarra, with a quarter-final place up for grabs. O'Raghallaighs prevailed by a goal, 2-11 to 1-11, to book their place in the last eight. Therein they lost to St Kevins by four points, 2-11 to 3-4, and the brave championship odyssey came to an end. But the vastly-improved Drogheda club had given as good as they got over SIX championship matches. The first of these was the Group B opener against the Finbarrs at Castlebellingham on Saturday May 31st. It was a thrilling encounter and O'Raghallaighs battled back from a six-point interval deficit to clinch a share of the spoils, 2-8 to 2-8, thanks largely to a brace of goals from prolific full forward Aidan Lambe. At Stabannon on June 19th, O'Raghallaighs continued to confound the critics when overcoming 2002 finalists Geraldines on a scoreline of 1-9 to 1-6 and the unbeaten record was sustained with a one-point victory over group whipping boys Sean McDermotts at Dunleer a month later. These results set up the epic group 'decider' against the Plunketts, which took place on the Newtown Blues pitch on August 7th. Despite two further majors from goalpoacher supreme Aidan Lambe and a wonderful all-round performance, the unlucky O'Raghallaighs were pipped by a point. Both themselves and Naomh Fionnbarra now had five points apiece and, given that they had drawn their group game, the subsequent quarter-final play-off at Dunleer on Sunday August 17th was always going to be close. O'Raghallaighs were clearly the better team and, after leading by six points at the interval, deservedly advanced with a goal to spare. However, the Kevins proved a bridge too far in a five-goal thriller at Dunleer... All things considered, it was nonetheless a good year for the Drogheda club. Says Cathal: "We had a better championship run and were challenging at the other end of the league table for most of the season, even though there was very little between top and bottom all year through. It was messy at the end because nearly everyone got dragged into the relegation dogfight. We knew we had to make a 100% improvement and we've done that. "The narrow loss to the Plunketts was probably the best indication of the improvement we've made. When we played them last year in the championship, they beat us well but in 2003 we ran them close twice. They only beat us by a point in the intermediate championship and by the same in the Grogan Cup." Despite losing that cliffhanger to their near-neighbours, O'Raghallaighs still clinched a place in the knock-out stages of the IFC. The Kevins, however, are a hardened championship side and the Philipstown men spoiled the party. Was it a game O'Raghallaighs could have won? "We could've won if we'd played better! We'd played them a week earlier in the league and beat them by nine points to six. So we were confident going into the quarter-final but we weren't as prepared for them on the day as we should've been. "They had held some lads back from the league game and they were also much more physical than us. It took us a while to waken up to that aspect of the game and by then our chance was gone. At the end of the day, they were more focused on the championship than we were..." For 2003, O'Raghallaighs persevered with the same management team that had guided their fortunes the previous season - Ja Clarke, Des McGinty, Benny Markey, Noel Smith and Ambrose McGinnity. With the spectre of relegation removed and the experience of a year's intermediate football behind them, they quickly settled into their stride: "It was a great relief to beat Westerns in the last game of 2002 and we didn't want to be in the same position again. So we decided to have a decent attempt at the league and to see what happened in the championship." Cathal continues: "We weren't just aiming for survival. There was no point setting out to just try and stay safe. Instead, we decided to try to push for promotion. We knew looking at the division at the start of the year that everybody would take points off each other and that's exactly what happened. "We learned from the mistakes of 2002. We weren't as naive defending and we scored a lot more goals. Of course we still have a long way to go, but we're heading in the right direction. The same lads were here again and we also have a few good young lads who have come in and been a big addition to the team. We've experienced two years outside junior now and we don't want to go back! "Prior to 2001, it had been ten years since O'Raghallaighs had been out of junior football and hopefully we'll now stay out of it for good. "One thing we're very disappointed with is the way the season dragged out. The league started in April and we were only half way through our fixtures by September. That made it hard for us to play with any sort of continuity. The situation doesn't make any sense ... we played sixteen matches in nine months - and it's even worse for the junior 2s!" Are O'Raghallaighs happy in general with how 2003 worked out on the field of play? "Yes. We took a few teams by surprise in the championship ... I don't think the Finbarrs, Geraldines or the Plunketts expected us to be such a handful. So we were very happy with our championship form considering where we were coming from and how close we were to being relegated in 2002." Cathal McGinty has been on the O'Raghallaighs first team for seven years. To date the centre back has collected a junior championship and two winter league medals. Is further silverware on the 2004 agenda? "We want to progress ... to get more young lads through and to hold onto Aidan Lambe for another season at least. Aidan has been a tremendous servant to the club and he's still a very important player for us up front. If he stays on, we should be pushing for promotion to senior. "We've plenty of young blood in the team and there are more players coming through from underage ranks. Craig McEntaggert, Keith Hughes, Graham Leech and Stephen Smith are four young lads who made a big impression this year and they're all capable of going on to represent O'Raghallaighs on the biggest stage. Overall, we're in a much happier position this year and hopefully it'll be even better again in 2004!" Tweet

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