Salthill-Knocknacarra and Corofin will face each other again this year in the county minor final which is fixed for Sunday (2pm ) in Pearse Stadium.
In last year's minor decider Salthill had a comprehensive victory and Brian Murphy's young Corofin charges will not want to suffer two consecutive county final defeats to the same opposition.
Murphy is hopeful his side's two games with Mountbellew/Moylough in the North Board competition will have helped his side.
"We have some very talented youngsters on our panel who are improving as the season has gone on and we are hoping they will produce a big performance on Sunday” he says.
“ Salthill-Knocknacarra are a very good side and we will have to be at our very best to beat them, but we are travelling to Pearse Stadium in good spirits. They beat us well in last year's final, but that is 12 months ago and both teams are very different now. We are looking forward to the challenge and we will be giving it our best shot."
Murphy and his management team of Jimmy Sice and current Corofin senior player Gary Delaney will be looking to team captain Conor Cunningham, Ryan Ludden, Brian Raftery, Cathal Reilly, Liam Silke and free-taker Jason Leonard to show the leadership and guile to bring the county minor trophy back down the N-17 on Sunday evening.
The Salthill-Knocknacarra minors, under the management of Mike O'Flynn, have some niggling injuries ahead of Sunday, but they boast a large panel.
O' Flynn is joined on the management team by team trainer PJ Kelly, and selectors Brendan Keane, Paul Seagrave and Padraig O' Connor.
They are hoping county minors Evan Wynne and Séan Hughes, and other high quality players like Jack Reilly, Paddy Kitt, Andrew Butler, Brian Seagrave and the impressive Cormac O' Connor can produce the goods to put two county minor titles back to back for the club.
"This is a very successful panel of players who have done very well at u-14, u-16 and minor level in the past with the club,” says O’Flynn, “ and we are hopeful they can get a win this weekend. They are a fantastic group of lads to work with and they have worked really hard all year to get to this stage. It is all on the day in any final, but we are confident that if they perform as we know they can, we will be there or thereabouts."
