Donncha helped turn tide back CBC’s way

Brendan Gallagher continues his series looking at rugby’s great schools

LIMERICK might be considered the modern-day heart of Munster Rugby, and nobody can deny the contribution that great city has made, but over the decades it has always been Cork down in the south east of the province that has dominated the schools rugby scene and provided an endless conveyor belt of talent for both province and country.

The two great fee-paying schools of Ireland‘s second city – Christian Brothers College and Presentation Brothers College – have between them won the Munster Schools Cup on 61 occasions and the only serious long-term challenger to their domination with 26 titles has been Rockwell College in Cashel, Tipperary. The Limerick contingent led by Crescent College, have, frankly, barely been in the frame.

Let’s look this week at CBC as Christian Brothers are styled, although sometimes it is just Christians. This is the home patch of most of the extensive Murphy rugby clan and of hard-nosed locks like Donncha O’Callaghan and Donal Lenihan not to mention Munster cult hero Billy Holland. Tomas O’Leary was both a rugby and hurling star at the school .

CBC has also been the nursery for countless stalwart Munster players, perhaps best epitomized by back row man James Coughlan who is currently the Toulon defence coach.

They won the first-ever Munster Schools Cup in 1909 when they defeated Rockwell College and titles followed regularly thereafter, although the top dogs all the way up to 1970 were always Rockwell College.

Noel Murphy senior – who went on to win 11 caps at flanker for Ireland – was a star man in their Cup-winning side of 1922 and some records also suggest that he appeared, as a fifteenyear-old, in their Cup-winning team of 1920

A generation later his son – also Noel Murphy and also a flanker – took the lead in their Junior Cup triumphs in 1951 and 1952 and their Senior Cup victory in 1954 over Rockwell. Noel Murphy junior went on to eclipse even his father with 41 Ireland caps and eight Lions Test match appearances between 1959 and 1966. After retiring he also went on to become Mr Irish Rugby, both coaching and managing the national team while he was also coach to the 1980 Lions.

Subsequently he became one of Ireland’s IRB board members and served on the board of the Heineken Cup. His son, Kenny, made 11 Test appearances for Ireland in the early 1990s.

It was in 1971 that CBC began a run of eight titles in ten years including four in a row between 1971 and 1975. They were the schools team in Ireland and although the Irish schools selectors traditionally seemed to favour the Leinster contingent, Munster finally began to garner some representation.

Lenihan, the future Ireland skipper and then manager, starred in the 1976 and 1977 teams and the following year CBC had three players in the Ireland Schools side that lost just 12-10 to the all-conquering Aussies Schools line-up with their three Ella brothers.

That run of success seemed to completely blow Rockwell out of the water – they have won only five titles since 1970 – and the only school to consistently take up the gauntlet has been their great rivals PBC although Crescent College and St Munchin’s have occasionally landed blows for the Limerick schools.

That run in the 70s, however, set the bar very high indeed for CBC and there was growing concern in the 1990s when PBC reeled off five wins in six years and seemed to be heading for a period of utter dominance.

At which point many at CBC started redoubling their efforts – not least Garrett Fitzgerald whose contribution is related elsewhere on this page – in an attempt to combat the old enemy. And that included scouting out some of the best players at other smaller schools and offering them rugby scholarships. This was war. Whatever it took.

One such player was an athletic raw-boned lock with attitude, a certain Donncha O’Callaghan who arrived from Highfield School to become the lynchpin of their pack in 1997 when they finally got back to winning ways.

Against a St Munchin’s side including outstanding fly-half Jeremy Staunton and future Ireland and Munster colleague Jerry Flannery, CBC marched to an 18-0 lead in the final but found themselves trailing 21-18 late in the second half before they recovered to win.

The following season O’Callaghan was still a force on the school’s circuit although over age for the Ireland Schools team. He did, however, star for the Ireland side that won the U19 World Cup, still the only global rugby competition Ireland have ever won.

After that second golden era titles became harder to win although there were welcome triumphs in 2003 and 2009 and a very hard-fought 9-8 win over Crescent College in 2016.

It was heroic last-ditch defence that won the day against Crescent and the boot of James Taylor who landed three penalties. Christians spent the last ten minutes defending their line and, at one stage, Crescent seemed certain to score with a three man overlap when lock Andrew Thompson stuck out his long arm and the ball stuck – the interception of his life.

Although the Cup competition was shelved last season because of Covid, CBC and PBC were jointly awarded the title in 2020, 12 months after they had played out a nail-biting finale at Musgrave Park when CBC squeezed home 5-3.

It was the first final played on the new 3G surface and although tense, it was far from a classic. When skipper Scott Buckley dived over for an unconverted try in the 13th minute few of the 6,000 fans present would have envisaged that being the winning score. But it was. PBC clawed back a penalty a few minutes later and that concluded the entertainment for the day as strong defences held sway.

The referee even allowed an agonising seven minutes of injury time but still there was no further score.