*Daniel Vaughan and Paul Lynch on the goal-line. Photograph: Mark Hayes
TULLA captain Paul Lynch will lead his side from the full back position in Saturday’s intermediate hurling final and he’s in his nineteenth season playing adult hurling with the club.
Lynch first made Tulla’s senior side in 2004 and he was wing back when they won the Clare SHC in 2007.
He outlined, “The goal all along has been to win the intermediate title and get back up to the top division. The season didn’t start too well and we didn’t have a good league campaign while we lost our first round game against Ogonnelloe. A couple of things went wrong for us. David McInerney was injured that day while Tony Leyden was sick. We have improved with every game since then”.
According to Paul “we were very nervous against Inagh/Kilnamona but we then pulled away. We were well up for the Bodyke game, they are neighbours and rivals. Parteen were well on top in the first half and after that we got on top. We are focussing on getting a good start in the final. We do believe we have a good finish”.
To have been relegated from senior in 2019 was “massively disappointing. We started the campaign well but a cruciate injury to Daragh Corry was a blow and we never really recovered. We should have beaten Wolfe Tones, Clarecastle were better than us and the Mills were stronger. The last few years haven’t gone well for us,” he acknowledged.
Tulla “won’t be using excuses” this time round, the full-back stressed. “We have numbers now, we have a few lads travelling down from Dublin each week. We have two of the Harty Cup winning team from the local St Joseph’s in the side and they are really standing up as leaders and we have more from that team coming through. We have a panel of thirty six or thirty seven. It is important for Tulla to get back up to senior”.
It’s been a few years since these clubs clashed at adult level. “They beat us in the first round back in 2017. Things didn’t go too well for me that day and that is something I want to correct. Look we are very focussed on this game. The last couple of seasons haven’t gone our way. The winning of the Harty Cup earlier this year was massive for Tulla. It was the stuff of dreams, winning that title with players drawn from a small area. There is massive work going on in our club and the opening earlier this year of our new stand was huge. It’s more than just a stand as there is a gym, there is as meeting room and a physio room and it has really brought the standard up for us. We have the facilities within our own club”, the captain said.
Concluding he said, “we have a huge battle ahead of us. They have as much hurt from the last few years as we have and they will be coming to Cusack Park with the same aim. They have played in a few more finals than us. We are very focussed on this game and we will be going into Cusack Park to win the title”.
