By Shaun Casey

BY just taking the field on Sunday afternoon, Holy Trinity, Cookstown will be creating history.

This is the first group from the Tyrone college to ever contest a MacRory Cup final and they’ve made it here in impressive fashion.

John McKeever, who takes charge of the team along with two-time All-Ireland winner Peter Canavan, said his side are in “dreamland.”

“It’s a great occasion for the school. There was a lot of excitement building up for the semi-final but now we’re fortunate to be in a final, the buzz has even got larger again. We’re really looking forward to it,” he said.

“To be in a final, it’s nearly dreamland for us. The thing about it is a lot of schools would love to be in this position, so we have to get the heads down over the next couple of days and get the focus and the concentration for the game. We’re definitely looking forward to it.”

Holy Trinity have been the surprise package of the competition and saw off two of the traditional big-hitters to reach Sunday’s showpiece in Abbey CBS along with 16-time winners and defending champions St Patrick’s, Maghera.

While McKeever was delighted to get over those two obstacles, his side remain focused on “one more massive hurdle.”

“To get by two schools, the Abbey and St Pat’s, with a great tradition in MacRory football. We would have come up through vocational and then four years ago we won the MacLarnon, this is our third year in the MacRory.

“To beat those two schools this year, we’re obviously delighted about that. But we’ve one more massive hurdle ahead of us in St Mary’s, Magherafelt and we know the brilliant school that they are, the great management team that they have and the players they have.

“We would need to be at our best to stay with them.”

McKeever, who will also lead his home club Portglenone for the upcoming season along with Canavan, suggests the target was to get past the group stages and reach the last eight of the competition.

“I think it is a big surprise, us getting to the final, because our target at the start of the year would have been to firstly get by the knockout stages because we were in a tough enough group.

“Just to even get to a quarter-final was an achievement. Two years ago, with lockdown there was no competition last year, two years ago we got beat in a quarter-final by St Pat’s, Maghera.

“That was the big challenge this year, to try and make progress to get over the quarter-final. When we beat the Abbey in Páirc Esler a couple of weeks ago, that was a target that we had set.

“We were nearly in bonus land in a semi-final. So, we got our heads down for the semi-final and now we’re in a final, so we’re delighted.”