Crossmaglen Rangers will put their All Ireland Club ambitions on hold when they depart for a two-week holiday in Florida early in the New Year.
The holiday for the players and officials has been planned for some time and is a reward for winning the Armagh, Ulster and All Ireland titles last year.
Crossmaglen secretary Gerard Rushe maintains, though, that it will not be a case of all play and no work for the Rangers.
"No indeed. We will keep our focus quietly and maybe do a bit of light training in Florida, but we won't get too excited although we know that immediately on our return we will have an All Ireland Club quarter-final against the London champions Tir Conaill Gaels," explains Rushe.
The fact that the Rangers have now won twenty-two finals on the bounce will not send them into what should be a relatively straightforward task with any slight degree of complacency, though.
"We certainly won't be dropping our guard in London. We play at the Ruislip ground which is very compact and may take a little getting used to," admits Gerard.
Rangers captain John McEntee has already won a huge swathe of honours with the club having been in the side for over a decade, but he underlines the current spirit within the side when he says: "These boys want to keep on winning. Maybe going to Florida just immediately prior to the All Ireland quarter-final is not thought of as being such a good thing, but the holiday has been booked so we are just going out to enjoy ourselves."
McEntee was man of the match against Clontibret and Mayobridge and was his usual commanding self last Sunday against St Galls in the AIB Ulster Club final.
"You would have to feel for St Galls who reached the final but just lost it in the final quarter," he says.
Crossmaglen manager Donal Murtagh faces an anxious wait as key forward Tony Kernan recovers from the broken collar bone he sustained in the second-half against St galls.
"We will just have to wait and see. Tony has been doing very well for us and just before he was hurt he had swung over a great score - one of only two we got in the entire second-half," stresses Murtagh.
Kernan is certain to miss the January quarter-final and it is likely that he will be replaced in attack by his brother Stephen who himself is just getting ship-shape again after a spell on the sidelines with injury.
Stephen thought he might have made the side against St Galls but it was not to be.
"Now I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I will be ready for the quarter-final. I'm just itching to get back into action - I would make a very bad spectator," smiles Stephen.
Source : http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/
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