Stapleton: First game vital in new look club football championship

The pressure is on teams to win their opening game as the County Senior Football Championship gets underway this weekend.

The delay due to Covid-19 has resulted in a number of changes to the format with just the top team in each of the four groups progressing to the semi-final.

Analyst Shane Stapleton says Friday nights clash between Loughmore – Castleiney and Ballyporeen in Group 1 is a case in point.

“This is probably the one match they didn’t want to see coming up – to face each other first.”

“It’s a difficult one – if you could find your feet with a win or two and then see how you’re fixed towards the end of the competition it might be a bit easier.”

“This is going to be a titanic struggle and probably a winner takes all – no disrespect to Ardfinnan and Moyne the other two teams in the group.”

“This is a whole new game-plan and whoever is first out of the blocks is going to have a huge advantage because it’s going to be very, very hard to claw it back.”