Nickey Rackard round one

Warwickshire v Tyrone

Sunday, Pairc na hEireann, 12.30pm

IT has been a memorable season for the Tyrone hurlers to date whose success in the National League last week has provided them with the perfect platform for the start of their Nickey Rackard Cup campaign on Sunday.

The team, fresh from their marvellous victory over Armagh, will now travel to Birmingham for their meeting against Warwickshire. They will travel over on Saturday, and will be hopeful of maintaining their good run of form.

A comprehensive victory was recorded by the Red Hands when they met Warwickshire in the National League in February. Now more of the same would do nicely indeed for Michael McShane and his players.

Among them, of course, is Chris Kearns. The Naomh Colum Cille clubman and Antrim native has been a key member of the squad now for several years and he is looking forward to what the remainder of the 2022 season holds in store after the joy of achieving their long-awaited promotion.

“It’s a great feeling to be the league champions and this was my first medal with Tyrone. A lot of other players have now won their first silverware with Tyrone and to be heading up to Division 2B next year is brilliant,” he said.

“We will be playing at a higher standard of hurling from 2023 and that was our main target. For hurling in Tyrone, the fact that we got the win over Armagh is very important for the promotion of the game.

“The team went through the league campaign unbeaten. If we had lost to Armagh, there would definitely have been a downer in the camp. But we’re now heading into the Nickey Rackard with a spring in our step and the big game against Warwickshire is one that we’re certainly looking forward to.”

Tyrone reached the Nickey Rackard Cup final last year and will be aiming to go one better than the defeat to Mayo in the final at Croke Park. This Sunday’s tie against Warwickshire will maintain a busy period of action for the side. Important ties await, including against Armagh and Donegal, with the result that nothing will be taken for granted by either the management or the players as they bid to maintain the momentum of their 2022 season.

Kearns is under no illusions about what lies ahead, and is relishing the prospect of getting more important match action as this year approaches its climax.

“We did well against Armagh, especially when they pressed near the end. But we held firm, learned from before and were on the right side of the result,” he added.

“The players have learned from their mistakes in various games over the past years and hopefully now we can take all that work into the championship.

“We played Warwickshire in the league for a few weeks ago and beat them. But they’re going to be a totally different proposition in the championship, so with luck we’ll get the right result again.”

One thing for certain is that Tyrone’s hurling progress is catapulting them onto a higher level and the coming weeks offer them a golden opportunity to consolidate that progress in the Nickey Rackard, as they reflect on the achievement of winning a long-awaited promotion from Division 3A.