By John Harrington

Derry U-21 hurling captain, Ciaran Steele, says he and his team-mates won’t fear playing Kilkenny in Saturday’s Bord Gáis Energy All-Ireland U-21 hurling semi-final.

The Oak Leaf County are massive underdogs, but they won the Ulster Championship in some style and won’t lack for confidence.

Many of them have already won Nicky Rackard Cup medals this year, and with a true believer like Collie McGurk in charge of both that team and this U-21 team, it’s no surprise to hear he has convinced the players they can go toe to toe with the Cats.

“We're huge outsiders but, like, our manager put up a picture the other day of a Derry player and a Kilkenny player and he asked us what the difference was.

“There were a few answers that weren't correct, and in the end he said the only difference was the jersey.

“And that is the only difference if you look at it that way. We're all hurlers, we're all human. Down there in Kilkenny they're born with a hurl in their hand more or less, in Derry we have to work a bit harder to get up to their level, but there's definitely a belief in the camp that we can match them if we bring the physical edge and pressure and produce the goods in front of goal.

“In championship anything can happen on the day too. It's not even the fear factor, everyone is relishing the challenge of, you know, playing against the best hurling team of the past 15 years or so.

“Our team is just buzzing to get at them, you know.”

Since taking charge of both the Derry senior and U-21 teams this year, Collie McGurk has had an immediate and profound influence.

Hurling in the county looked like it was on the wane in 2016, but he’s turned things around in seriously impressive fashion by getting the best players in the county to commit to the cause again.

“He's hugely important to the development of hurling in the county,” says Steele.

“You have to give him a lot of respect for getting everybody out, putting it in everybody's heads that we can compete with the teams down south.

“He plays a massive role in the success we've had this year.”

McGurk commanded respect in the dressing-room from the first day he strode into it because of his own reputation as a no-nonsense player back in the day for club and county.

“I heard he was a bit of a hatchet man!” says Steele with a smile.

“There's stories around Dungiven that boys might have been afraid of marking him. Once we were shown a video of him in a schools’ final.

“He was centre-back, the ball fell to his feet twice and he swung twice, missed it. Swung back the way towards his own goal just to hit it, missed it again.

“He was swinging everywhere. I think he only got a yellow card for it, there was boys around him getting clips and everything.”

McGurk was certainly a physical player in his day, and to some extent he’s moulded this U-21 team in his own image.

They have plenty of skill too, but the controlled aggression and hard physical edge they hurl with was key to their Ulster Championship success.

“The physical edge in Derry hurling is key to Derry winning games,” says Steele.

“A lot of the players would play football and that would stand to them as far as physicality is concerned. The more physical you are the more pressure is put on the opposing team.

“That's standing well to us and he's emphasising the fact we have to be physical in games. Having said that, there's a lot of good hurling in Derry."

Derry’s Ulster U-21 Championship success was their first since 2008 and for it to come in the same year as the Rackard Cup is a serious shot in the arm for hurling in the county.

“It was just great for the county,” says Steele. “To beat Antrim is to get that psychological edge. We were growing up getting beat by Antrim teams.

“We played Down before and there was times that they would have beat us and we'd have beaten them. It was always even. First of all, the one against Antrim was fantastic for us boys.

“The Nicky Rackard gave us confidence too. We're coming through games sort of unharmed if you know what I mean.

“We weren't coming out thinking, 'Jesus, we could have been beat there, we need to step it up for the next game'.

“We were coming through and were happy with our performances and seemed to be putting teams to bed.

“You know, it shows people that this is actually a good team and we need  to push on in the next few years and compete in the Christy Ring as well.

“As far as U-21 is concerned, the players are looking at that there and thinking it's us boys that actually won that, it's not just the seniors, because a lot of our boys were U-21.

“It was good to get the Nicky Rackard under the belt and it stood well to us in the Ulster championships.

“We just want to push that on now as well.”

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