Denn hungry to push on, says Gaffney

JFC final build-up

Denn captain Bernard Gaffney lets his football do the talking. The centre half-back has been an outstanding leader for the Crosskeys men as they have driven through to the Junior Championship final so for now, it’s a case of mission accomplished.

“We are where we want to be, the championship final. At the start of the year, that’s where our goal was so, yeah, we are happy to be there,” ‘Beanie’ told The Anglo-Celt.

“The work-rate of the lads I suppose [was the difference in the semi-final]. We definitely knew that Shannon Gaels are a very strong outfit. They’ll probably be disappointed that they didn’t probably push on as they could have but we were just happy to get across the line today and get to the final.

“We were hungry, maybe just a little bit hungrier on the day and maybe it came down to that just as much as it being drilled in. Our forwards and everyone tackled and worked hard and we were very happy with that.”

Coming into the 2020 campaign, there was a real sense of determination in the Denn ranks to right the wrongs of other seasons.

“We felt we were under-achieving for the last three, four years. We have a young team but it’s probably just starting to ripen a little bit now. Look, we are not going to do any bragging, we have nothing achieved yet and we have a lot to do yet.

“But yeah, I think we under-achieved in previous years so we are just looking to get the best out of ourselves this year and see where that takes us.”

The lockdown period disrupted preparations but in a way, it did Denn no harm. With a quicker run-in, players are totally focussed on their football for the last couple of months and the results have followed.

“It affected us big time, lads lost a lot fitness over it,” said Gaffney.

“We probably didn’t do anything for a couple of months really. Then when it opened up again, we regrouped fairly sharp and made sure to get the ball rolling because it was going to be a short season.

“And maybe it suited footballers as well. It’s a short season and when it goes on so long, lads can lose interest but when it’s a bit shorter and tighter this year, lads have more interest.”

While Denn are, as he says, primarily a young team, they have a sprinkling of veterans who have been around the block with club and county and have tasted Senior Championship finals, too.

“Old World War veterans!” Bernard joked.

“Some of them are still there, Mossy (Corr) and the two Franks (Adrian and Martin Cahill) and even Mousey (Colin Kiernan) decided to get his togs on again! Yeah, the experience is there too, it’s great to have that mixture of youth and experience. They’re good lads to have ready to rock if needs be.”

What does it mean for the club and the local area for the team to be in a county final again?

“It’s massive really. Just to give the community a little bit of a lift. The camogie girls were very unfortunate yesterday and hopefully we can rectify that maybe next weekend. It’s great to give our community a lift and if we can put a smile on people’s faces from our parish, we’ll definitely try our best to do that.

“We’re not going to take it any different to any other game. It’s just another game of football really, another 60 minutes of ball. We’ll just get back training on  the field as normal and focus on our own game, give it our best shot and see what happens.”