Big seven days for Ormond as they aim to retain third tier status

By Thomas Conway

So here we are. A relegation play-off is not where Nenagh Ormond wanted to be at the end of the 2021-2022 season. Arguably, it is not where they deserve to be either.

Dissect their season and you’ll discover trends which, at times, seem full of contradictions. How could a side, so powerful and deadly on the front foot, end up ninth in the table, with just five wins and 28 points? How could a club, which has proven itself so adaptable to personnel changes and management transitions, now find itself fighting to retain Division 2A status.

But dig a little deeper and you’ll find a string of reasons, a series of underlying factors all loosely connected to one another. Injuries, absences, Covid - unfortunate, external event which seemed to occur at the most inopportune of moments, upsetting the flow and derailing the team’s progression.

Neither the Nenagh Ormond Head Coach, Mike Kennedy, nor the club’s Director of Rugby, John Long, would ever countenance self-sympathy, but in fairness, this senior team has been mightily unlucky. But regardless of what preceded it, there’s no denying that this relegation play-off - a double-edged, two-legged affair - is a game of monumental significance for the club. Long drilled that into his players weeks ago. Many of them, perhaps all of them, would have been aware of Ormond’s proud history, but he educated them on it nonetheless, emphasising the importance of these two fixtures for Nenagh Ormond as a whole.

“Staying up is huge, it’s massive,” Long said.

“I spoke to the players a number of weeks ago and I said, look, it’s not about me, it’s not about you, at this point it’s about the club. We have to think about how hard it was and how long it took for a small town like Nenagh Ormond to gain senior status and get to 2A. Doing that was a huge, huge achievement when you think of the player pool that we have.

“To be competing against big city clubs with rugby schools feeding into them - and it’s not long ago that we were at the other end of the table, in a promotion play-off to go up. So, it really is about the club at this point, it’s about keeping that status and keeping that identity for Nenagh Ormond.”

This relegation play-off is also important for Nenagh in a wider context. That identity which Long speaks of is knitted into the tapestry of Nenagh town - it is part of the area’s sporting culture. North Tipperary is, in many people’s eyes, the home of hurling, but it has always retained a proud tradition of excellence across multiple sports; soccer, rugby, athletics, tennis - the region is awash with talent on many different fronts. Whatever the stage, the calibre is high.

But relegation play-offs are rarely the place for swashbuckling rugby. More often than not, they resemble a battle, and in this case, the battlefield could be a decisive influence. Mike Kennedy is well aware of the challenges Nenagh will face when they make the trip to Derry next Saturday for the first leg. Rainey will be pumped up by their own supporters, just as Nenagh will be in Lisatunny the following week. As Mike explains, Nenagh can't afford to be too conservative, nor can they risk completely letting loose - that may be leave them exposed. Striking a balance, based on the circumstances, will be key.

“First and foremost, there are two games and if you win those two games then you’re safe. So that’s your primary focus,” Kennedy said.

“We would be aware of the crowd - the last time we went up to Magherafelt there was quite a vocal home crowd. So, there are going to be lots of little small things, lots of small obstacles like that.

“With the two legs, it’s all very well to say that you’re going to go up there and play cautiously in the first leg and all that. But you have to see how the game develops - you don’t want to put shackles or handcuffs on the players. We just have to be tactically smart, tactically aware, and we have to focus on trying to get what we want - which is a win."

Aside from scrum-half Nicky Irwin, who is nursing a slight injury, Ormond effectively have a full squad, in full health, to choose from. It is a squad worthy of Division 2A status, in a club which has a stream of underage talent ready to flow into the senior set-up. The next few weeks will be critical for Nenagh Ormond. Expect high-drama, tension, and impassioned rugby.