Any rugby we get this season will be a bonus, claims City of Derry Head Coach

By the time the present N.I. coronavirus restrictions are reviewed next month, it will mark almost 12 months since the Judges Road club were defeated by Clonmel on February 29th, 2019 in All Ireland League Division 2C, the club’s last competitive fixture. Since that time, City of Derry have played the sum total of two friendly games and O’Kane, whose own contract at the club is up for renewal in May, admits the club is in a state of limbo at present.

“We are not really much further forward (than we were in November)” explained O’Kane, “The AIL is gone for the season. The first directive we had was that they were hoping to have competitive rugby back up and running for January 30th but obviously that’s now gone. That was just before Christmas but then everything went back into lockdown again.

“The last directive we had is that we are completely closed again for six weeks. No mini group training, no usage of gym, nothing, so we are back to square one until February at least.

“We just have to sit and wait at this point. They keep saying you need a couple of weeks contact training in before you play games but the reality is we won’t have done anything in six weeks; we won’t have played a game of rugby since the start of September, so realistically the earliest you could get a game played would be maybe March.

“You would have to spend February doing a pre-season of sorts and then a few games. The season is extended until May 22nd and they keep telling us there is an endeavour to get some rugby played so that’s all we have to hope for, that we get some sort of rugby.”

With All Ireland competition off the table, O’Kane says if they can get rugby restarted he is expecting something similar to the Energia Community Series which began earlier this season before being shut down due to the pandemic.

“It is just going to be regional based,” he adds, “It will be Ulster based, possibly a restart of the Energia Series, possibly getting the Senior Cup played, splitting Junior teams into regionalised groupings to play.

“At first team level for ourselves, I don’t think much will change. If there is any sort of competitive rugby, it will most likely be a re-run of the Energia Series but there has been no definitive plan. We have heard very little bar that the AIL was not going to take place and that the domestic season was null and void and that there would be new fixtures and a new format brought out. I think everyone has basically turned their attention to next season from a rugby point of view. Whatever rugby gets played now before the end of May will be a bonus.

“If we get any rugby this year it will be a bit of a free hit, just to get boys back out and playing rugby again. We are nearly 12 months down the line with no rugby. Two games in almost 11 months and very, very little training through that period. Come February, it will be a full year so it is going to take a fair amount of work to get the bodies and minds up and running again for competitive rugby.

“You would like to think once this vaccine is rolled out, they are talking around May or June to get that done, hopefully then a degree of normality should return. If this was to rumble on beyond this season, then there would be a lot of clubs dead in the water.”

The lack of rugby this season means some of the players recruited last summer by O’Kane and his management team have already departed Judges Road, a source of frustration for the Head Coach. Richard McGregor, who was sub-teaching at Foyle College, finished that post at Christmas and is now based back in Lisburn, suggesting he is unlikely to be available for any re-start while Eoin McDonald, a hugely promising hooker signed from Randalstown and who was studying at Magee, is going out on a placement this year and unless that placement is in Derry, he may also depart. Richard Baird, is another unlikely to feature in the future with a planned move to England in the coming months.

Yet, despite the difficulties, O’Kane feels the current lockdown also presents a chance to start again and rebuild.

“There is massive restructuring work to be done at the club but potential wise I don’t think there is a club with greater potential in Ireland,” adds O’Kane, “That’s what I would love to see happen but it would take a concerted effort by everyone moving in the one direction.

“As a club, we have to get our vision right, that thing that drives the club. Every club has a vision and an idea of where they want to go.

“We are not that far away and things can be turned around relatively quickly. If you look at how we have performed over the past couple of seasons, we are much closer to going up than we are to, say, being a junior club which would be hugely detrimental for the club.”