………. both games we were not able to show much hope for the rest of the year. We were dragged straight back into a relegation battle 12 months after making promotion play offs. Our next assignment was away to promotion chasing Aghyaran and even though we did play a bit better we still secured no points. At this stage we only had two games to play; at home to Moortown and away to Kildress and neither would be simple. Against Moortown we took our eye off the ball and they gave us a good beating. The next week was one of the most intense efforts that I have seen being put in by all committee members and players. It looked that a victory away to Kildress would secure our Intermediate status for the year. But this would not be easy as Kildress were chasing promotion. In one of the best displays of the year we went to Kildress and battled very hard for 1-13 to 0-13 victory. We thought we were safe but the powers that be applied the silly rules that there are. As a committee and a club we once again found ourselves facing the Ulster Council and then the powers that be in Croke Park. To make a very, very long story short, we were cast into the lion’s den that is a relegation play off. First up we faced Gortin and were well beaten that day in Greencastle. Next up was must win game at home to the Rock. That day we stepped up to the plate and delivered a good victory. Our Final game of the season was a winner take all affair against Owen Roes in Killyclogher. This was game in which we took a comfortable lead that we almost threw away. But at the end of the day justice was served and we retained our Intermediate status for 2016.

 I hope that this unfortunate experience will in time turn out to be a positive one for us. Bad rules are bad rules but we ended in a play off because we only had 12 points. We had a lot of young lads involved in this dogfight and the experience they have picked up should stand to us in good stead for the next 10 years. But when you see that we were able to beat Kildress twice this year and look at Trillick’ s success it makes me wonder how much more we could achieve if we all really apply ourselves. Kildress will be a senior team for 2016 and Trillick will start the year as county champions. These are both teams that we have competed well with over the last couple of years but where they have ended up and where we are now is very far apart. Why? Do all of our ambitions match up? Are we happy to have a nice place and just tick along or do we want to push on?

Our championship campaign started off with a tough assignment in Greencastle against our close neighbours Kildress. In a game played in very testing conditions we ran out the winners by a single point on a score of 1-5 to 0-07 points. This set up a ¼ final tie with Urney. This game was played on a Friday night in Omagh at 7.00 PM. In the first half it looked like we had this game in the bag but we faded in a big way in the second half and Urney won by 6 points. This game felt like an opportunity had been missed.

The Reserves this year were greatly weakened because of injuries to key senior players. They won 8 out of 13 games in the League finishing in 6th position and they fell at the first hurdle in the Championship to Kildress. But the development of young players over the previous two years double winning Reserve team, played a key role in helping us retain our Intermediate Status.

Look it’s been an OK season and we need to take all the positives from that and learn from our collective and individual mistakes. For a great year on the field I want to thank Eamonn

.. Cavanagh, Tiffy Quinn, Mickey McCullagh and Paddy McDonald. Special thanks to Eamon,

contd