ON THE RISE: St Finbarr's Ben O'Connor clears his lines as Charleville's Andrew Cagney closes in, during their Cork Premier SHC clash at Mallow. Pic: David Keane

There’s a blue wave coming.

And while this blue wave might not wash up the steps of Páirc Uí Chaoimh’s South Stand at the beginning of next month, it is coming.

On the April evening of Cork’s Munster U20 hurling semi-final against Tipperary earlier this year, Donal O’Mahony’s starting team contained four players from the St Finbarr’s club.

Accounting for almost one-third of the Cork team, it goes without saying that the Barr’s contingent dwarfed every other represented club.

One of the Barr’s quartet, Jack Cahalane, was in his third season with the U20s, introduced as he was during the second-half of last summer’s delayed 2020 All-Ireland final against Dublin. Clubmate Brian Hayes was another Barr’s youngster used off the bench that same afternoon when Cork won a first All-Ireland at the grade since 1998.

Six weeks later, Cahalane, Hayes, and two more of the aforementioned quartet - Ethan Twomey and Ben Cunningham - were present inside the whitewash when the Cork U20 class of 2021 made it back-to-back All-Irelands.

Three days on from that, Ben O’Connor - the last of the quartet - and William Buckley were central cogs in the Cork team that ended the county’s 20-year-wait for All-Ireland minor honours.

A scroll down through Cork’s substitute list and extended panel from that minor final shows two more Barr’s boys, Shane Kennedy and Cian Buckley, bringing their representation to four in total.

Across Cork’s three All-Ireland final wins last summer, six Barr’s players saw action, the most of any club in the county.

And so given the calibre of underage player being turned out by the city club, it is hardly surprising that the Barr’s team put out for their Round 3 Premier Senior tie against Sars two weeks ago contained one U21 (Hayes) and five U20s (O’Connor, Buckley, Twomey, Cunningham, and Cahalane). A sixth U20, Ciaran Doolan, was second sub in.

Before arriving onto the club’s senior team, these seven players contributed handsomely to success at U16 Premier 1 and U21 Premier 2 level in 2019, followed a year later by a first Premier 1 U18 title since 1997.

That 23-year drought highlights the extent to which the Barr’s had fallen off the pace at underage level. Getting back, says senior selector John Cremin, proved no “overnight fix”.

“Those underage wins were more the result of a concerted effort at underage level over many years than simply a case of all this talent arriving together at once.

“Historically, if you go back to our glory days in the 80s and 90s, we would have had a very strong underage set-up and you’d have had a conveyor belt of talent coming through. And then, the success at underage level dried up and maybe the structure at underage dried up too.

“Part of that was the demographic challenges the club would have faced. You wouldn’t have had a lot of houses being built in the area. It was a more mature area.” 

In rebuilding and rebooting their underage wing, household names such as Jimmy Barry-Murphy, Donal O’Grady, current senior manager Ger Cunningham, and Kevin Murray took on coaching roles to guide the next generation of Barr’s hurler.

Theirs was a heavily populated coalface, too many hands gracing the pump to mention them all.

Speaking after the minor win two years ago, Barr’s manager Brian Hurley remarked that “one swallow doesn't make a summer. We know that well. We'd the U16 county last season, this minor, the U21 Premier 2, and hopefully we'll keep bringing lads through”.

Having reasserted themselves on the underage scene, Hurley’s latter point represented the Barrs’ next challenge - to make sure players graduated to the adult ranks.

That six U20s featured against Sars two weeks ago is evidence plenty that the conveyor belt is moving smoothly.

“In many instances, you can get success, but you don’t get players,” Cremin continues. “And that’s the critical point here, we are seeing the players coming through, which is hugely encouraging for all those associated with the underage to see the fruits of their labour.” 

Victory over Douglas in tomorrow’s quarter-final would leave the Barr’s one hour from a first county final appearance since 1993.

“We won a minor county a few years ago and we have talent coming through, but people need patience to see that develop,” said Ger Cunningham after they overcame the Rockies in Round 2 last month. “There will be ups and downs along the way.” 

Correct though Cunningham is, there have been more peaks than troughs of late.

The blue wave is coming.

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