Stars captain Tully aiming for third SFC medal

SFC final preview

Damien Donohoe

When Barry Tully runs out at Kingspan Breffni this weekend he will do so for the seventh time on county final day. At 31, the Kingscourt Stars captain has been part of more big days than most players ever experience, and yet, he says, it still feels special.

He was 18 years old in 2012 when the Stars lost out to Mullahoran in a replay. “Yeah, very young,” he smiles when reminded how early his final career began. “It is a good record and something to be proud of, but as we said before, we’ve only won two of the six so far. Please God we can set that straight now, maybe balance it up a bit.”

Over the past decade and more he has seen the club scale the heights, stumble, regroup and now, in 2025, return to another decider.

The last final appearance came in 2023. Twelve months later, Kingscourt failed even to reach the quarter-finals, a jolt that stung the players and the club alike. Tully does not shy away from it.

“I think it’s an attitude thing,” he reflects. “We knew last year wasn’t us. We can pitch at a much higher level than that. There were numerous reasons, players missing, injuries, but not making even a quarter-final hurt. We knew we were better.

“In fairness to the new management, they put the spark back into us. As a group we agreed this is what we needed to do. It’s paid dividends. At the start of the year, it didn’t look good, and we maybe thought last year’s level was where we were at, but thankfully we’ve turned it around and are now showing our true level.”

It wasn’t immediate. The first five league games yielded no wins and Kingscourt seemed to be stuck in reverse. Tully explains why the mood inside the dressing room remained calm.

“To be honest, in those first five we played the so-called big three and we were competitive in each game,” he says.

“We didn’t lose by much so we knew the performances were there. It was just a combination of missing players, bad luck, and the other teams being slightly better on the day. We knew we weren’t far away. As the year went on, we progressed and improved, and here we are.”

That progression has been obvious. Kingscourt have upset some of the established order, forcing their way into the conversation about the county’s elite. Some felt disrespected on their behalf when the “big three” were routinely cited without mention of the Stars.

“To a small extent, yes,” Tully admits. “But the way last year went, and the beating Gowna gave us two years ago, from the outside looking in we probably didn’t deserve to be in that conversation. But as I said at the launch night, we know the levels we can compete at. We’re not far away from the so-called big three. We’ve drawn with Crosserlough, beaten Ramor by the minimum. We’re competing at that level at a minimum. Next Sunday it’ll probably take another level or two again, but we’ll see how we go.”

Tully’s role has also evolved. From the young lad soaking up experience from established stars he is now the captain trying to pass that on to a new wave. Five 19-year-olds played in the semi-final win.

“For me it’s about training and playing as hard as I can, leading by example,” he says. “I’ll say something if I have to but I’m not going to be shouting and roaring for the sake of it. I just put the effort in and hope it rubs off. To be fair, they’re a great bunch of young lads. Half of them were in that minor team last year, they have that competitive edge and winning mentality. It makes my life easier, I’m not dragging them through, they’re nearly pushing us older ones on. It’s great in that sense.”

Kingscourt have had strong underage sides before but perhaps lacked consistency. Recently there has been a more deliberate focus.

“To the best of my knowledge there was,” Tully says. “That age group last year was probably special, in the next four or five years you could see six or seven of them as mainstays of the senior team, which doesn’t happen too often. There definitely is a focus on underage and hopefully it will reap rewards, but I think last year’s group was a bit of a one-off.”

Now comes the ultimate test and Tully has huge respect for the Gowna.

“Gowna are the standard bearers,” he says. “This is their fourth final in five years. They’ve won two and lost one on a replay. They made a show of us two years ago. We know the level they’re at and what we need to be at just to compete. Fair play to them, they’re doing something right. They’ve phenomenal players, full of inter-county quality. It’s going to be tough but we’ll relish the challenge.”

He jokes about one of his own young stars, Aaron Shekleton, who reminds him of veteran Alan Clarke. “He is, but I think he’s got better feet on him,” Tully laughs.

“Alan used to just launch it forward and hope for the best, Shek hits it with a bit more accuracy! There’s a bit of class about what he does.”

Kingscourt’s history includes many occasions where they arrived as outsiders and left with silverware. Tully is comfortable with the tag.

“I suppose we normally are the underdogs coming into these games and it’s something we relish,” he says. “Some people might write us off and Gowna will be rightly favourites. For us it’s a challenge to put that right, to put ourselves back in the conversation. If things don’t go well next Sunday, at least we know for next year we’ve young players and we’ll build again. We might not be such rank outsiders then.”