Residents of Cork-Tipperary border show true colours as local rivalry heads for Croke Park turf

Irish Independent

5 days ago

Sunday's All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship final between Cork and Tipperary might be taking place in one of Europe's most impressive stadiums, TV channels and column inches filled with analysis of the big match, and thousands are due to tune in across the world, but…
'This is where you'll get the real story here now!' Emmett Allen says with a big, broad, welcoming smile, gesturing to one of the delivery men, dropping off goods to his garage-come-corner shop in Araglen.
'This is a nephew of one of the coaches, now, he'll give you the inside track!'.
Kevin O'Rourke is, in fact, the nephew of Dónal, AKA Ducky, coach of Cork hurlers, and a man that Pat Ryan has said has done a 'fantastic job' with his group of players over this championship.
'I'm getting plagued with tickets, it's hard to get any work done this week!'
'Dónal has been coming here right throughout the winter, so we've been getting the inside track in here all along!' Emmett says.
He's one of the very many characters, passing in and out of this tiny yet throbbing heartbeat of one of a few parishes caught in the crossfire ahead of Sunday's enormous hurling clash.
Two customers, who live 10 minutes away but are situated on the Waterford side of this three-county conglomerate, are rolling their eyes and bracing themselves for the inevitable exercise in brave face come Sunday, when once again their more storied neighbours are standing on the steps of the Hogan Stand.
'I don't care which one wins, to be honest,' one of them says, 'I'm sitting on the fence,'. Figuratively, and almost quite literally.
'The border has been a great addition to the sport this week,' says Emmett, who is the current occupier of the shop his Dad first opened over four decades ago. 'There's great rivalry in the three counties, even great banter, and hopefully the best team win on Sunday.
'I have Rebel blood, Cork born and bred,' says Emmett, who will be heading to Croke Park on Sunday with his daughter Niamh, hoping she will finally see the Rebels lift Liam MacCarthy in the flesh for her first ever time in three decades on the planet.
'I've offered my stand ticket to be with her on the terrace this Sunday, and it would be brilliant for her to finally see Cork win an All-Ireland.
'I had Seamus Harnedy in there the last week; he was probably out with Mike Fitzgerald to get hurleys. There's a great buzz, and we do stir the aul' pot from time to time, throw in the spanner and get the boys going in all three counties!' he says, with a cheeky grin on his face, as the Cork GAA flag flies proudly outside.
'It goes on all through the year, you could be down the pub, and even some of the lads got up early in the morning to put up colours on the Tipperary side, and then the Cork lads as well.
'This is the man you need to talk to here now, he's a Tipperary man,' Emmett says, interrupting his train of thought, as another delivery comes to the door, along with a few more customers, picking up lotto tickets, cuts of beef, and the gossip ahead of Sunday's final.
Michael Hoolihan is a Grangemockler man, but very briefly crosses into the Rebel County on one of his weekly runs, as he tries to keep a low profile behind enemy lines. I suggest calling in sick should Cork win at Croker.
'Ah, no, we couldn't be doing that!' he says, 'You have to take it on the chin like a man. They're a very young team, and Cork are definitely underdogs. If Tipp start like they did against Kilkenny the game will be over, Cork have a lot more goals in them than Kilkenny!'
Michael is also one of the lucky few with a ticket, but has a quick request for Emmett as he goes out the door.
'Do you know anyone who would swap a stand ticket for two terrace tickets?
'TWO terraces, for ONE? That now would be very hard,' he responds, as Michael packs up to head back into more familiar territory.
With Michael, I too head out the door and take a quick trip back along the road to Kilworth, a commuter village on the outskirts of Fermoy. 'The Village Inn' also has both Cork and Tipperary flags hanging out the window, as I enter to investigate.
Tom O'Brien's mother, Chrissy, is behind the counter, whose late husband, Mick, is the reason behind the Premier flag.
'My father is from Ballyporeen,' explains Tom, a village just across the border further north, whose claim to fame is being the birthplace of Ronald Regan's great-grandfather. Regan himself visited the village on his Presidential visit in 1984.
'He took over the pub in 1976 and passed away in 2012, so we have the flag up in his memory', said Tom, who only took over the pub himself three years ago. 'We have a good few Tipperary fans now that would stop off in the pub on the way back from Páirc Uí Chaoimh with my Dad's roots, so we have great craic in fairness now between the two sets of fans.
'There's been serious craic and banter around this week now. It's the only thing people are talking about, the match, and getting tickets. The world could be falling around us, and that's still all they'd be talking about!'
The day is soft, but nonetheless people are in good spirits. I cross a young man selling bunting, flags, and the ubiquitous 'hats, scarves, and headbands,' on the main street of Mitchelstown. Once a bottleneck for traffic heading up to Dublin, now anticipating a mass exodus on Sunday from those on either side of the nearby county bounds.
'I'm down here from Galway since last Monday week,' says Calvin Ward. 'There's great craic here now in fairness, I'd say we're selling 50/50 Cork and Tipp,' he says, as another interested customer comes over and picks up a large flag, destined for display outside a nearby house, 'Up Tipp' is shouted in the background. 'I'm a Galway man myself, but I'll be selling here until late Saturday evening.'
And for Sunday?
'Oh, I'm staying in Cork, so hopefully Cork wins!'
Half-and-half jerseys are also being sold in the town, a bright idea by local sports store 'ID Sports', which has leveraged its own manufacturing facility to churn out the special edition jerseys right in time for the big match.
'It's been absolutely crazy, the buzz around town has been absolutely unreal,' says manager Vicki Murphy, whose own sister has postponed flights home to Australia to get to the match. 'The fact that we just got these made up last week, and they hit our store on Monday, and we've had massive interest.
'It's absolutely brilliant, and it's great for the town as well, the fact that we're smack bang in the middle – we also share a border with Limerick, but we won't say anything about that!
'The All-Ireland is a different ball game, people literally have goosebumps talking about it. It is a friendly rivalry, I'm firmly rooted like an aul chestnut tree in the Cork camp, but the half and half jerseys have taken off, especially with the kids being caught in the middle, trying to plamás one child and then the other!
'My nephew is 100% Tipp, and he even asked me to make him a birthday cake the other day. Of course, he wanted Tipp colours!
'I said to him, 'my house will go up in flames, I can't have Tipperary on my table!', but sure he was delighted.
'You even pass people in the shop and you give them an aul 'Up Cork!' and then they shout back 'Gowan the Prem!', it's just brilliant!'