St. MICHAEL’S Coach Dom Corrigan is worried that Ulster Schools’ GAA face losing the high profile of their big showpiece St. Patrick’s Day final after a motion for Post-Primary All-Ireland Championships to be completed by the weekend after St. Patrick’s Day was passed by Congress last weekend.

The MacRory Cup is the blue ribband competition for Ulster Schools and has been televised live on BBC on St. Patrick’s Day since 1999, along with the Schools’ Cup rugby final.

Indeed, St. Michael’s featured in that opening live broadcast when they defeated St. Colman’s in the 1999 decider, while they also featured in the last final, beating Omagh CBS in the 2019 final.

The last two MacRory Cup competitions have been hit by the coronavirus and not completed.

However, with the MacRory Cup final now having to be brought forward to allow the All-Ireland to finish within the new timeframe, Corrigan is fearful that it might lose out on the live television exposure that it currently enjoys.

“Ulster is the envy of Leinster, Munster and Connaught because we have live coverage on St. Patrick’s Day of our showpiece schools’ final as part of a big day of schools action.

“We don’t want to lose that exposure of live coverage of a MacRory final on St. Patrick’s Day,” said Corrigan, who would like to see the date for the completion of the All-Ireland pushed back to the end of March to allow the MacRory to continue on its traditional date.

“This was a decision made in Croke Park, and nobody even thought of the consequences of what it meant.

“The St. Patrick’s Day final live on television is an integral part of Colleges football,” he said.

“We fought for 30 years to get our big schools final on the television, just like the schools rugby final, and we have had that since 1999 – and I think, for the sake of an extra week or so, we shouldn’t lose that.

“It might mean playing a MacRory final to a finish on the day, but I don’t think any college will have any complaints about that.

‘A highlight of their careers’

“I think for the vast majority of players, that playing in a MacRory Cup final live on television on St. Patrick’s Day is the highlight of their sporting careers.

“Why not finish post-primary competitions at the end of March? That would give you two weeks to then run it off. I would hope that Ulster Colleges will look to appeal that decision,” he added.

Meanwhile, it was confirmed last week that this year’s Ulster Schools’ competitions has been cancelled – a decision that Corrigan was expecting.

“It is very disappointing, but we knew that the signs weren’t positive this last month or so.

“We thought in December before we broke up for Christmas that there was a strong chance that we would get it back again, but then once January came the [Covid] numbers weren’t good.

“Even at that, when we did eventually get the word, it was hugely disappointing. Unfortunately, we are not out of this pandemic yet, and there was just no chance that we were going to get playing,” said Corrigan.

With Covid-19 having brought competitions to a premature finish last season, Corrigan revealed that there are pupils who will be entering Year 10 in September who have not had the chance to pull on a school jersey yet

“It is disappointing for everybody in the school, because it obviously affects all the teams, from MacRory Cup right down to Year 8 and Year 9 pupils.

“A big number of boys come into St. Michael’s and one of their goals is to play football and put on that jersey to compete against other school teams. That is a big part of school life for them, but they won’t have that.

“Our present Year 9s who are going into Year 10 in September, they haven’t played in any competition; they have had very little school football up to now, and going into Year 10 and not having put on the school jersey – that has been unheard of for years.”

He acknowledges, though, that it is the Year 14s who have been hit worst with the decision.

“For the Year 14s who are leaving the school, it is a body blow to them, because you love playing MacRory Cup football in your last year.

“It is the year that you tend to take the big memories from, and to not have that opportunity this year is a massive disappointment for them.”