St. James’ on brink of breaking into senior

Date Published: 14-Oct-2010

Dara Bradley

AN Spidéal are on the cusp of a rare achievement in Galway football – graduating from junior to intermediate to senior in just two seasons. One of the last teams to scale those heights in such a short time was Mervue in the late 1980s, who now of course constitute part of St James’, the amalgamated Renmore/Mervue city side which stands in the way of An Spideál’s glory.

Outsiders with the bookies, An Spidéal have kept the momentum going since winning last year’s junior A county final against Headford and the Gaeltacht club have every reason to be fearless – if not quietly confident – going into Sunday’s Claregalway Hotel intermediate football final at Pearse Stadium (2pm).

They are there on merit. Beating Clifden, Corofin (in the back-door after a defeat to Menlough), Oughterard and Oranmore/Maree on their surprise march to the decider, An Spidéal also won the junior Comórtas Peile na Gaeltachta competition held in Belmullet in June.

Instead of just consolidating their position in intermediate, An Spidéal strove to get back to senior for the first time since winning promotion to the grade in 1999, which lasted three years. In and around the same period the likes of ‘keeper Pádraic Lally and the Ó Callaráin’s, Micheál and Lórcan, were involved with Galway inter-county set up.

They remain important figures a decade later. Lórcan, a key man in getting them to intermediate, has been unavailable this year although he did make an appearance in the semi-final and should feature at some stage on Sunday.

Midfielder Micheál is important at centrefield; his brother Brendán Óg Ó Callaráin, who kicked 1-6 of their 1-10 semi-final total, is their chief scorer. County minor Éinne Ó hEochaidh was injured earlier in the year and is coming back to fitness but the loss of captain and full-back Aodán Breathnach (knee) is a big blow.

St James’ have been tipped to make the breakthrough into the senior grade for the past few years and are favourites – again – to do so now.