It has been a rough start to the league for St. Martins this intermediate campaign.
With four games played, the club finds themselves at the bottom of the totem poll staring at a relegation semi-final. This weekend league encounter versus Carrickshock won’t mean much as to their standing but could put them in good stead heading into a championship.
The club does have a lot of newer, younger players coming into the squad playing with experienced folks like Paddy Nolan and John Mulhall. The aim when speaking to St. Martins midfielder Shane Kinsella seemed to be about connecting the team together heading into a crucial stage of the year.
Related: Glenmore’s Eoin Murphy looks back at the All-Ireland and ahead to the Shamrocks
“We relish the opportunity of rectifying our bad league so far. The championship is where it is at. Lots of teams go bad in the league, just look at Johnstown last year lost their matches, won the first round, were not fancied, and ended up in a semi-final and probably should have got to a county final.”
“We need to get a performance together and settle down the team. Getting ready for the Championship is the main thing. We are going to finish bottom of the group, the match (v Carrickshock) cannot get us out of trouble and bit it can build a strong base for the championship.”
“Our club is in transition. We lost a lot of stalwarts over the years. We just have to bring the young lads in and blood them into championship hurling.”
The bottom of the intermediate league is a long way from the All Ireland senior club glory which they won in 1985. The closest they have got to since have been county final losses against Ballyhale Shamrocks in 1991 and 2007. Kinsella would love to be back fighting for top honors but knows the graft that needs to be done to accomplish that
“You want to play as high a level as you can. Dropping down the grades is always hard to come back up. You think it may be easy to come back up but nothing is easy in Kilkenny.”
Listen to this full interview this Saturday on Scoreline from 2 pm