Naas ready for Cuala in first game under lights at Cedral St Conleth’s Park

When handing over the Dermot Bourke Cup for a fourth successive time to Naas the weekend before last, County Chairperson Mick Gorman mischievously reminded them that they were carrying the hopes of the county into next Saturday night’s Leinster Club Senior Football Quarter Final against first-time Dublin champions Cuala.

“No pressure,” laughed Gorman, but of course there is pressure. And anticipation. Any player or supporter worth their salt will be licking their lips in anticipation at the first night game under lights in Cedral St Conleth’s Park (throw-in 7.15pm).

For Joe Murphy’s side there is a sense of the “now or never” about this year’s Leinster campaign. As a reminder the only rock Naas have faltered on inside or outside the county is a Kilmacud Crokes shaped one, two Leinster Finals sandwiching a Quarter Final defeat over the last three years.

Naas could probably have done with being eased into the provincial campaign after two difficult and nerve-wracking games in Kildare against Athy and Celbridge, one going to extra time and finishing the right side of a one-point gap in the other.

I always take the view, however, that first time county champions are particularly vulnerable in the opening round in the provincials and Cuala’s success over Kilmacud was a seismic and, no doubt, heavily celebrated occasion for the Dalkey club who have come up through Intermediate and Senior B in the capital over the last decade or so.

A huge part of that success, of course, is Con O’Callaghan, and his availability for the game after an appeal during the week overturned the red card he received in the Dublin is undoubtedly a huge boost. 

If Cuala have been celebrating hard that might give Naas their opportunity to push past the Dublin champions, a result that would no doubt see them leapfrog their opponents as favourites for the title. This is their first game in the Leinster Senior Championship after winning their first top level Dublin title - but not their first game in St Conleth's Park. in 2012, Monasterevan beat them 1-14 to 0-10 in a Leinster Intermediate Championship semi-final.

Some would say Naas have been preparing for Leinster all year, and while that might explain their somewhat robotic path through the Kildare championship, it seems unlikely they would take that risk and expect to suddenly turn on a tap two weeks after the county final.

Naas will take positives from coming through those last two challenges when the chips were down. Kildare teams generally don’t have a great knack of doing so, but they will take bring that confidence and know-how into a game that will surely, particularly at this time of year, be something of a dogfight with very little between the teams.

While O’Callaghan is the Cuala dangerman, Joe Murphy’s side will rely again on Darragh Kirwan’s outstanding form but in Mick Fitzsimons, the man who sets the standards for club and county, Cuala will feel they have the man to curtail the Kildare forward.

Naas may have to look for answers from other players on Saturday and the form of Dermot Hanafin and Neil Aherne has been impressive through the latter part of the local campaign, but the strength of Murphy’s side is in the collective and their well-practised possession game, supplement by pacey runs from overlapping defenders.

Cuala are a hard-working team who were more clinical than Crokes and defended superbly at times that day. And with Dublin teams having won nine of the last eleven Leinster titles (Moorefield and Mullinalachta the only spoilsports in that spell) they justifiably carry the favourites tag coming into this one.

Naas at their best can prevail. Either way a memorable occasion awaits.

*The Naas v Cuala match will round off a hectic day of action for Kildare teams in Leinster. In Manguard Park there is a double header of action with Moorefield taking on Wexford’s Castletown Liam Mellows at 1.30pm AIB Leinster Club Junior Hurling Championship

. That is followed by Ellistown v Grattan Óg of Longford at 3.30pm in the AIB Leinster Club Junior Football Championship. In the Intermediate grade at 1.30pm, Caragh play Kilkenny’s Dicksboro in Freshford.