Slaughtneil seek to make a statement with looming Loughrea clash

Slaughtneil’s dominance of Ulster and Derry hurling is well documented.

Thirteen county titles in a row, six Ulster crowns in nine years, and two separate back-to-back provincial triumphs have firmly established the Derry kingpins as perennial All-Ireland contenders.

Yet for the mercurial Chrissy McKaigue, Robert Emmet’s story feels far from complete. Saturday’s far-from-vintage 0-23 to 0-10 victory over a dogged and spirited St John’s was enough to deliver Slaughtneil their sixth Four Seasons Cup, but it was not the finished, fluent performance their supporters know they are capable of.

Now, with the daunting prospect of Galway’s Loughrea in just under three weeks’ time, McKaigue is acutely aware of both the size of the challenge ahead and the improvements required if Slaughtneil are finally to take the next step.

The Ulster final itself reflected a sense of a team still searching for their top gear.

“It’s no mean feat for a club like ourselves to be winning Ulster titles. “But we’re ambitious, and we really want to make a statement in the next step, and it’s going to be a mammoth task against Loughrea.

“The first 40 minutes were very scrappy,” McKaigue admitted. “St John’s were very well set up and played with a sweeper for the majority of the game.

“It was hard to get into a flow, but I thought our game management was very good. We did enough when we had to do it, and I think that by the end we were pulling away, and that’s the sign of a good team.”

Despite their provincial and county dominance, the All-Ireland semi-final remains Slaughtneil’s most stubborn barrier.

They have fallen at this stage on every attempt, including last year’s agonising 0-18 to 0-17 defeat to Cork’s Sarsfields.

That lingering hurt has fed into a real sense of unfinished business within the camp, and McKaigue freely admits that it is fuelling everything they do.

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Slaughtneil 0-23
St Johns 0-10

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“The whole club has just seemingly taken an upward trajectory”

“Look, there’s massive ambition,” he said. “We feel as a club we left an All-Ireland football title behind us, and we have never gotten past this stage, but we want a statement win at national level in hurling because we’ve been close to it more than a few times. We can’t look beyond it because we haven’t gotten over this stage before,” he continued.

“That’s the big incentive. Loughrea come with a tremendous pedigree, but our big thing is to try to get into an All-Ireland final, and that’s all we’re focusing on.”