Pride of the Bride..

To have a Club player win an All Ireland medal in any grade in the GAA is marvellous for the individual, their family, Club and County so we in Bride Rovers are doubly proud and honoured with the achievement of the Roche twins Brian and Eoin. A first ever Under 20 Hurling Title for Cork and Eoin Roche in defence and Brian at midfield were vital cogs in a superb team performance from Cork Not since 1998 had an Under 21 All Ireland in Hurling been won by a Leeside team. In recent years the Under 21 Grade has been changed to under 20 but by a strange quirk of fate, because this was the delayed Final of 2020, it probably will go down in history as the under 20 Final where lads of 21 played! Cork haven't won the under 21 since 1998, Minor since 2002 and Senior since 2005 so this was a welcome victory. Four years ago Brian and Eoin were joint captains when Cork defeated Dublin in the Special 'once off' Under 17 Championship. That was a hard earned win in Croke Park and the same could be said of last Saturday night's win. I suppose Cork, with the brilliant start they got, never looked like losing but Dublin tore into the game in the second half. Cork's ten point lead was whittled down to just four. Cork responded well and a super pass from Brian helped the Rebels get a second vital goal. Named at No 10 (incidentally the jersey Seanie Barry wore in the marathon Final series v Wexford in 1966 !) Brian Roche started at midfield but was all over the place really. Eoin was rock-solid in defence and overall Pat Ryan's team deserved this very welcome win for Cork. With so many of the 2017 panel on duty on Saturday night this has really been a four year journey for these young Cork players. Cork lost the Minor Final to Galway in 2017 and lost two All Irelands at under 21 and under 20 to Tipperary in 2018 and 2019 so they have endured a fair amount of disappointment. All that was erased in Kilkenny on Saturday evening with a splendid display of hurling. Brian was picked as Man of the Match, an honour he well deserved. Well done Brian and Eoin, ye are a credit to yere family and to the Club. It was fantastic to have so many 'locals' on the team Daire and Shane from the Hill, Eoin Davis the gaolie from St Catherines, Eoin Carey from Kilworth -with Castlelyons and Bartlemy connections, Darragh from Ballygiblin, Ciaran Joyce from Castlemartyr - with Kilworth connections, Tommy from Midleton and Aaron from Carrig.  

Credit to Pat Ryan and his selectors and also to John Considine and Denis Ring who put in massive work with these lads since 2016.  Success at Under 20 /21 level is never a guarantee of Senior success but down the years Cork have often seen many of the younger brigade go on to become Senior players. Well done again to Brian and Eoin and to their parents Donal and Eileen and sister Emma. 

Cork's Results in the 2020 Under HC 

Cork 2 24 Kerry 2  10   Cork 2 29  Limerick  0  21   Cork  1  16  Tipperary  1  14  Cork   2  19  Dublin 1  18  

The history-making team was as follows: E. Davis (St Catherines); C. O’Callaghan (c)(Dromtarriffe), E. Roche (Bride Rovers), A. Walsh-Barry (Carrigtwohill); D. Connery (Na Piarsaigh), C. Joyce (Castlemartyr), D. O’Leary (Watergrasshill); D. Flynn (Ballygiblin), T. O’Connell (Midleton); B. Roche (Bride Rovers), S. Barrett (Blarney), S. Twomey (Courcey Rovers); P. Power (Blarney), A. Connolly (Blackrock); C. O’Brien (Liscarroll/Churchtown).

Subs: J. Cahalane (St Finbarr’s) for O’Brien (39); E. Carey for Twomey (41); B. Hayes (St Finbarr’s) for Connolly (50); S. O’Regan (Watergrasshill) for Flynn (54); Cormac O’Brien (Newtownshandrum) for Barrett (56).

The 1966 Under 21 Win.

!966 was a marvellous year for Bride Rovers and for Cork. We won our first ever Junior B Grade Hurling title in November when we defeated Youghal by 6  12 to  6  3. Cork Senior Hurlers won the All Ireland after a 'famine' of 12 years and our own Seanie Barry was one of the stars of the Senior team and also of the Cork under 21 team. In the early rounds of the Munster Under 21 Championship Cork defeated Waterford by 6 10 to  1  2 in Fermoy. Galway who were then competing in Munster, were beaten in the provincial semi final by 1  17 to  2  2 on August 15th. With so many Seniors on the u 21 team  the Munster Final in the grade wasn't played until the Thursday night after Cork beat Kilkenny in the All Ireland Senior Final. Naturally Cork hurling was on a high and a huge crowd turned up on that Thursday night to see Cork take on Limerick at the old Athletic Grounds. The traffic was chaotic so much so that Cork Dual Captain (Senior & U 21) Gerald McCarthy was late for the game! He came on as a sub and Cork pulled away in the second half to win by 5  12 to 2  6 with Seanie scoring 1 1. With Galway competing in Munster Roscommon were the Connacht champions without a game! They travelled to the Athletic Grounds on Sunday September 11th for the All Ireland semi final. It turned out to a complete mis match with Cork winning by 11 18 to Roscommon's 5  1.. That saw Cork in their first ever All Ireland u 21 Final and what a Final it was! It took three games to separate Cork and Wexford.  The first game was in Nowlan Park and the headline on The Examiner on Monday October the 3rd was "Barry Saves Day For Cork". 

The game ended in a thrilling draw Cork 3 12 to Wexford's 5 6 and Seanie Barry scored 2 8. The teams met for the second time on October 23rd in Limerick. Again another thriller saw both teams score 4 9 -there was no such thing as extra time or penalties in 1966. Seanie scored 5 points in that replay. Sunday November 6th saw Seanie Barry star as the Rovers won the B grade title. A week later he was lining out in Croke Park for the final episode of the u 21 trilogy. This time Cork made no mistake and won well by 9 9 to 5 9. . The Cork scorers were Charlie McCarthy 2-2, Eddie  O'Brien 2-1, Peter Curley 2-1, Andrew Flynn 2-0, Seanie  Barry 1-2, Justin McCarthy 0-3.

So it's all of 55 years ago since the first All Ireland u 21 medal came to the parish. Now Brian and Eoin Roche are on that exalted list.

BRIDE ROVERS WEEKLY LOTTO

Results from our Draw on Tues July 6thth, the Jackpot was €20,000 and the 4 numbers drawn were 1, 10, 14 and 21 and  there was no winner. The winners of the €30 were John O Connor, Gillian Gould, Shanahan family Castlelyons,  O Flynn family St Bridget's Tce. and Mary McMahon. . You can join the Bride Rovers weekly lotto online at http://briderovers.ie/  or purchase tickets from any of the retail outlets locally that are open. Tickets can also be got locally from Bride Rovers GAA Club Members throughout the parish. Your support of the weekly Lotto Draw is deeply appreciated. If you're not in you can't win and each €2 is a help for our ongoing promotion of Gaelic games. A yearly ticket at €90can also be purchased. 

UNDER 7s  The last couple of weeks, there has being a small break from the Go games and we continued our training sessions of football/hurling. All the boys really enjoyed these sessions. One can see the skill levels improving all the time

This Saturday 17^th July, we will continue the Go Games series. We are at home against Nemo Rangers in hurling.

Rebel Og Under 16 HL.  Bride Rovers 1-15  Kiltha Og 2-07.
 Last Saturday we travelled to Dungourney to take on the local side Kiltha Og in our third under sixteen League tie. It's often said 'When you don’t put in a good performance and still win it’s a good sign' -well that was the situation in this particular game. We struggled to get into the tempo of the game from the start. It was a tough physical battle, which the lads normally can handle but for some reason we couldn’t get our 'fast moving of the sliotar game'  going. At half time we were ahead by a single point, 7 to 6.   Kiltha Og found the net just after half time.  We were now two in arrears. In fairness the lads kept batting. At the second water break we were 2-7 to  0  12 down.  We finished out the last quarter strongly.  The forwards struck for a couple of points but the important score was a goal from Colin. Another white flag ended our scoring. The lads knew they didn’t perform well but every team is entitled to an off day and a win is a win.
Panel Frank. Eldon. Darragh. Adam. Denis. Cillian. Cormac. Kieran. Ryan. Ronan. Kamso. Ciaran. Colin. Louie.  

Rebel Og Under 14 Hurling League.

Our under14 hurlers had there first league match last Wednesday evening when they were  away to Mayfield. It was their first league game together as a group in two years because of the covid restrictions. . We got off to a slow start conceding 1-2 in the first five minutes. Soon after that we steadied the ship and started playing really good hurling. The backs really tightened up and as we took control at midfield the lads up front got plenty possession. The scores started to come and  we ended up finishing the game with an easy win on a scoreline of  Bride Rovers 7:14, Mayfield  1-6. Many thanks to Mayfield  for the game and also the ref who did a fine job.

Under 18 Football. 

With the Minor (U 17) competitions stalled now on account of the Inter County programme the under 18 Football league has started. We were fixed to play Erins Own in Pynes field last night, Wednesday, the same night the Cork Minor Hurlers were Playing Clare in Thurles. 

UNDER 11's AT HOME. 

Our under11's are at home to Ballycastle Gaels on Saturday at 10 am  in Pynes field. 

Under13 training. Training continues as normal on Mondays. 

UNDER 15 HC.

Bride Rovers played the first round of the Rebel Og under 15 hurling Championship on Saturday last. We were at home against Ballyhea in Pairc Na Bride. It was a nip and tuck game all the way through.  There was some top class hurling produced by both teams in a typical championship encounter.  After a mighty game  Bride Rovers pulled through to get their first win of the hurling Championship. Final score : Bride Rovers: 4-13, Ballyhea :2-10 

Panel of players; Ben Knox  Ronan Barry Jack Mannix Oran Kielty Darragh Delaney David O'Connell Gearoid Gubbins Luke Harrington  Jack Keating Jack Hynes

Gearoid O'Connell Tomas Riordan Cormac Barry Cameron Sullivan David Cash

Shane Prendergast Jack Collins

Club Gear.

We still have a certain amount of Bride Rovers shorts and stockings available from our Club Shop. Please contact Betty on 086 1540902 or Kathleen on 086  3807784.

Also several new Product Lines in our Colours with the Club Crest are now available from O Neills at very reasonable prices. To look at the items go to the O Neills website www.oneills.com 

FIXTURES. 

Wed July 14th u14 FL v St Nicks 7pm 

                     U 18 FL v Erins Own I Pynes field 

Thurs 15th July  U13 v Kilara Óg in football at home.

Sat 17th July u 11 F v  Ballycastle in Pynes at 10am 

JAFC v Erins Own on Thursday July 22nd at 7.30 in Carrignavar

Fri 23 July u 16 HL v Cobh

Wed July 28th u 14 FL v Na Piarsaigh.

CORK MINORS WIN.

Late., late news. The Cork Minor Hurlers had a huge win ove Clare in Thurles on Wednesday night. It was great to have Cillian Tobin and Adam Walsh playing with Adam scoring two goals. Cork play Limerick in the Munster semi final next.
BRIDE ROVERS CLUB SPONSORS are; Rathcormac Tyres, Fermoy Print & Design, Veolia