There was a slight twist in the Oliver Plunketts story in 2001. Once again, it was a familiar plot which went along very similar lines. They were tipped for promotion and failed to deliver in the championship. But they did deliver an exciting new player who carries the potential to inspire the club to big things in future years. And so, despite the end result being virtually the same as each of the past God-knows-how-many years, there was one very significant change discernible on the Oliver Plunketts landscape in 2001: the arrival of a potential new hero in the person of young Emmet Kelleher, a man so precociously talented that many are already saying the Drogheda club's future destiny and his own are intertwined. His emergence onto the Wee County club scene was a real breath of fresh air as the gifted Plunketts man took to adult football like an overgrown Icelandic duck (i.e., a penguin) to ice. Disappointment may have been the Plunketts' lot once more at the season's end (even though they finished the year in fine style when defeating newly-crowned intermediate champions Naomh Fionnbarra in the Grogan Cup final), but this time it was tempered by a lingering sense of hope, a hope born from the appearance of a new character in what was becoming an otherwise unengaging story. It was Emmet Kelleher's first year on the Plunketts premier side and the 17-year-old youngster carved quite a reputation for himself with some sterling performances in the middle of the park. He's undoubtedly one for the future and the Slane Road men know they're lucky to have him. It's a mutual relationship - he feels lucky to have them too, and says he's looking forward to many years of senior football in the maroon and white jersey. This is a footballer with a great deal to look forward to and, in spite of his tender years, quite a bit of success to look back upon as well (at schools and colleges levels - more about that later). He was also on the Louth minor team in 2001. And he collected a Grogan Cup winners medal. But the year was tainted by the Plunketts' failure to escape the clutches of intermediate football, where they must now ply their talents for yet another season: "The over-riding emotion in the clubhouse at the end of the year was one of disappointment because we had set our stall out to go senior, either through the league or the championship. That was our objective and we have to hold our hands up and admit that we failed to deliver." The first-round championship defeat to the Geraldines was particularly hard to swallow. As usual, Oliver Plunketts had been pencilled into just about everybody's shortlist as prospective IFC winners at the year's outset, but they misfired badly on a day their forwards especially would choose to forget if given such an option. Emmet reflects: "The championship was bitterly disappointing because we had a lot of bad wides on the day and were basically guilty of kicking ourselves out of it. We seem to start every year as one of the favourites to go up, but it just doesn't seem to be happening for us. "It's difficult to put your finger on what exactly is going wrong. Last year, our efforts were definitely hampered by injuries to a couple of key players. Colm Fitzpatrick, for example, broke his arm early on in the year and he was a big loss. "Having said that, there are other factors too. There has been a general lack of commitment in the training ground which has worked against us. We get 14 or 15 players up at training every night, which probably sounds good enough, but the problem was that there were too many of the key players not turning up. "You need to have your strongest 15 at training every night. I know some of them would've had genuine excuses but there are one or two others who know they're virtually guaranteed their places anyway so they don't bother putting the effort in." Returning briefly to the match against the Geraldines: "We had plenty of chances but didn't take them," is Emmet's assessment of how things unfolded. "We kicked it away in the second half when we had eight successive misses within a 15-minute period. We wouldn't be renowned as a team that scores heavily anyway but we could always grind out results. Since we went out of the championship we started to take our chances and put together a run in the league, showing the kind of form that we should have been showing all year." Emmet Kelleher played with a maturity belying the fact that it was his first season on the team. He played mostly at midfield and also made the occasional appearance on the forty. He was on the St Olivers Community College team that won the Louth colleges title and also featured on Louth's All-Ireland-winning Vocational Schools side. And he played for the county minors. "We lost to Dublin in the first round. I came on as a second half substitute in midfield. We had a very good team and Jim McDonnell and Aidan McGuinness put an awful lot of work into it, but the whole preparations were severely disrupted by the Foot & Mouth outbreak and we couldn't train together. That ruined our chances." He also captained Oliver Plunketts to a minor league division three title. How was the step-up? "I began nervously but soon got used to it. It was a big change but you adapt to it after a handful of games. "I found that the championship was a much different pace to the league. I scored an early point which settled my nerves but to be honest I wasn't happy at all with my second-half performance. I felt that I faded out of the game." Plans for the future? "Our main one has to be to get up to senior. We have the footballers in the club. We have the makings of a good footballing team here and I'd hope to play senior football with them for the next ten years. We have youth on our side as well - there were two other minors as well as myself this year and then there's another group of players about two years older." Emmet says he'd also love to play at senior level for Louth one day: "The main thing over the next couple of years is to get the club up to senior and get experience at that level, but if you don't have that dream to wear the county colours then there's no point pulling on a jersey in the first place." Emmet is a son of well-known former Dreadnots footballer Dennis 'Dino' Kelleher. Dino was on the last Louth side to win the Leinster U21 championship back in the late 'seventies. His son could well feature on the next one - time is certainly on Emmet's side. It was meant 2B for Plunketts Oliver Plunketts received some consolation for the disappointment of failing to make the step-up to senior grade when they captured the 2001 Wee County Junior 2B Championship. The Plunketts were way too strong for poor St Fechins in an exceedingly one-sided junior 2B championship final at The Grove in Castlebellingham on Sunday October 7th. Played as the curtain-raiser to the replayed county intermediate championship final between Sean McDermotts and Naomh Fionnbarra, the decider was a one-sided affair from start to finish. The south Louth derby was expected to be a lot closer but two goals in as many minutes at the midway point in the first half were instrumental in virtually finishing it as a contest. Those two scores arrived courtesy of David Boylan and former county regular Paddy Matthews in the 16th and 17th minutes respectively and effectively banished what little wind had been in the Fechins' sails to begin with. The match got underway in conditions that could only be described as treacherous, with torrential rain determined to spoil the day. The goals came at a critical period as, despite having enjoyed complete dominance, the Plunketts only led by 0-3 to 0-2 until then. But with four unanswered points following the majors, they went on to compile a comfortable half-time lead, 2-7 to 0-2, and there was simply no way back for the Termonfechin men. Indeed, but for nine first-half wides, they could have disappeared further across the horizon. The fact that the Fechins went a full 43 minutes without scoring paints a more vivid picture of the game than any words could ever hope to do. The final was a mismatch of scandalous proportions, with Plunketts standing out as clearly a stronger and better organised outfit right from the throw-in. In fact, the twelve-point winning margin didn't even come close to reflecting the winners' superiority. The floodgates inevitably opened in the 16th minute when the ageless Paddy Matthews picked out David Boylan with a precise pass. The right corner forward made no mistake, finding the net's back with aplomb. Within 60 seconds, Boylan turned provider, returning the compliment by setting up Matthews for the winners' second goal. With 43 minutes left, it was all over. The winners took their foot off the pedal for the last ten minutes or so and eased across the finishing line the most comfortable of victors. Despite their best attempts, the atrocious weather conditions could not thwart a Plunketts side which had quite a few experienced campaigners on call. Oliver Plunketts, 2001 Louth Junior 2B Champions: Gary Bennett; Mick Kelly, Colm White, Robbie McQuillan; Gerard Fanning, Gareth Coyle, Sean Og Walsh; Diarmaid Coyle, Gerry Maher; Conor Walsh (0-6), Pat McHugh (0-2), Martin Morgan (0-1); David Boylan (1-1), Paddy Matthews (1-0), Kevin Matthews. Subs: Diarmaid McCarthy, Brian O'Neill. Tweet

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