This weekend marks the beginning of this year’s Intermediate Championship with St Pat’s, Teemore, Derrylin, Maguiresbridge, Tempo, Irvinestown, Belcoo and Newtownbutler all looking to take the 2023 title and move into the Senior championship.

Tempo will be looking to go one step further than last year after losing out to Devenish at Brewster Park in last year’s final - and the Maguires will be looking to one of their key players Tiarnan Bogue to help build on last year’s achievement.

“It’s always difficult losing a final,” said Bogue. “If we looked at the 2022 season as a whole, we came off the back of a disappointing league but took pride in that we were able to somewhat turn that around and make a championship final. The final itself I feel we could have no complaints, Devenish were the better team and worthy champions on the night.

He added: “2022 has instilled belief in ourselves that we are capable of making it to finals. Hopefully, we are able to channel the hurt of last year into performances this year and have a good championship campaign.

One big thing that Bogue took out of last year was how important momentum is under the new format and he is targeting a win in their opening game against Irvinestown.

“Despite the league format, it felt like every game was knockout for us. Getting off to a winning start in our first game was a watershed moment in our season, and we would be keen to emulate that again this year.”

With Tempo’s run to last year’s final some would consider them to be one of the favourites heading into this year’s competition but Bogue knows the difficulty of playing against teams who have been competing in Division One this season.

“Within the group, we feel we have a lot to prove in order to be considered a front runner.

“If you look at the intermediate championship objectively, there are four Division One teams in there plus Teemore, a traditionally ‘championship’ team just down from senior.

“We failed to earn promotion from Division Two this year and so are third seeding in our championship group as a result.

“There would, however, be a certain added internal pressure from both management and players in order to justify our making it to the final last year.”

And Bogue feels that the Maguires are in good shape going into the championship.

“Going into the first game, we are quite content with our preparation. We felt unlucky not to gain promotion through the league as we only lost one game, but we were overall pleased with our performances.”

He is expecting a stern test though from Irvinestown this Saturday.

“They are a team we have played numerous times over the past few years, and we are fully aware of their threats and ball-playing ability. They probably feel they were unfortunate to have lost in the same fixture last year, and no doubt they will be out to settle the score,” he commented.

It will then be on to games against Belcoo and Newtownbutler.

“In last year’s semi-final we also played Belcoo who have held their own in Division One this year so we will be expecting a tough test at home in our second fixture.

“Newtownbutler are similar to ourselves in that they were in the league promotion race right until the end and are disappointed to have missed out. They are a young team with plenty of speed and flair and can definitely hurt you if allowed to play. That final fixture could prove to be a critical one, but we will worry about that in due course,” he said.

So, what is Tempo’s target for the championship?

“We haven’t set any goals or objectives as such, but we have been fully focused on our opening fixture against Irvinestown.

“We are confident we can be competitive in this championship, but we have a long road to go in order to go one better than last year.”