February 21st – Grossportanlage Bocklemünd, Cologne
St. Brendans 9:12 (37) Cologne Celtics 5:9 (24)
On the first day of spring after a cold start to 2026, St. Brendans came to town. They were led by our former stalwart, Jack McCarron, and bolstered by Aachen Gaels men Tobias and Ota and our own Eamonn Kuepper. St. Brendans enjoyed a well-deserved victory in a high scoring game with great passages of hurling including fantastic long-range points and rocket goals.
Cologne were riddled with the usual post-carnival flu and missing several regulars, but they put in a highly credible performance against a team used to playing to a much higher standard. Celtics lined out with Finbar in goals, Jan, the Lazarus-like return of Damo, and Jeyson, our young star Lasse paired up with Fred in midfield, and our forwards rotated between Jack Cotter, Fabian, big Stefan and the returning Niall Kavanagh.
The game was played in a competitive but a good friendly spirit, which was a relief because the referee somehow lost his notebook for the first half running from the sideline to throw in the sliotar and was reduced to writing the many scores on the palm of his hand! Once St. Brendans adjusted to the dimensions of the field and to playing 9-a-side, they quickly racked up a big lead. However, in the second half, you could see a visible improvement in Cologne’s striking. Jack, mercifully almost back to full speed following his knee operation, found his range and began to shoot points from out the field. Fabian and Niall also got a few fine points, with Stefan scoring the perfect ‘bear in the square’ goal, plucking the sliotar from the sky, turning and burying it in the back of the net. Damo and Fred brought their usual athleticism and physicality, and somehow Damo seemed to have improved after having not picking up a hurley for more than two years.
Lasse spent the day shouldering people twice his size and can be very pleased with his first outing in midfield! And of course Jan was as cool as ever at the back and Finbar could not be faulted for any of the goals. Rather, credit must go to the Brendan’s lads accuracy and precision. Jack McCarron, after being released from goals for the second half, like a calf left out of shed in spring, couldn’t be stopped shooting points from his own half, clearly enjoying himself! The Aachen lads were very accomplished, particularly Ota the high-scoring Corkman, making his hurling debut on the banks of the Rhine!
But the day’s hurling was not done at that! We mixed up the teams for another 30 minutes of hurling and for the record, in a glorious under-10 like scoreline, the team wearing the Brendan’s jerseys won by 6:5 to the Celtics jerseys 6:1. For this match, we got all our camogie players who were not afflicted by post-carnival flu and our younger players onto the field. And none were younger than the bould Marten Power, who got the first goal of the match, appearing like a corner forward from the 1990s at the edge of the square, first time pull, and into the back of the net! And he didn’t leave it at that, he spent the rest of the match tormenting men twice his size and sometimes triple his age before going on to score a second goal, to the delight of his father Ger, and of course all Limerick people in the club!
Alicia’s camogie debut began with terrifying ease! Particularly terrifying because of her Viking-swinging-an-axe moves, before she also got on the scoresheet scoring a great goal in the second half. Eamonn to the delight of his band of personal ultras started catching high balls like a nonchalant German Aaron Gillane, before finishing his day with a glorious point. Altogether, 70 minutes of hurling was played, which will hopefully stand to the team in the upcoming Francie O’Connor cup on March 14th.
The club would once again like to thank St. Brendans and Jack in particular for making the huge effort to come out to play us. As Jack knows from his time hurling in the Rhineland, our biggest challenge playing hurling in Europe is the lack of games and chance for newer players to gather the experience and confidence you can only get through matches. So to be able to start our year with a match at home was absolutely fantastic. All of the St. Brendans lads, aside from being very experienced hurlers and used to operating at levels different to ours, were more importantly really encouraging to our younger and less experienced players (and some of the older ones), and were by all accounts of the few drinks that followed, simply all-round sound men! We would absolutely love to host you again sometime and will certainly take you up on your offer of a match in Dublin!
St. Brendans Abú & Cologne Celtics Abú!!
Cologne Celtics 