The Sigerson Cup draw has left fans with some mouth-watering ties, with Queen’s University’s first game against St Mary’s the pick of the bunch.
The trophy currently resides with University of Ulster who are the reigning champions, but both QUB and St Mary’s will be looking to grab it for their own cabinets in 2025.
Queen’s manager and former Down star Conor Deegan is excited at the prospect of playing in a local derby.
“My first thought was, ‘Okay, we’re not having to travel too far’,” said Deegan, who was at the draw of the Electric Ireland GAA Higher Education Championships at Croke Park.
“We have played each other recently, we would know each other well, generally there would be a lot of respect between the two colleges.
“It will be interesting — they will have no fear of us, and we have to reciprocate that. They are happy with the draw, we’re happy with the draw, we don’t have to travel too far, and it will be the new ‘Bel Clasico’ as the players are calling it.”
Interestingly, the 2025 Sigerson Cup will not be played under the new rules brought in by the Football Rules Committee, which will cause some complications for the managers to contend with.
A lot of college players will be training with their counties under the new rules, but will have to return to training with their further education institutions and compete under the old rules.
“The only positive thing about it is that they will be coming back to us to play rules that they have been playing with for quite a long time,” added the two-time All-Ireland winner.
“It should be a slightly easier transition going back to us than it would be going the other way, but it is going to cause a few problems.
“Our players are intelligent enough lads that they will be able to work it out, and it is just as basic as that unfortunately, but it is probably better that way than going the other way, which I think would be much more difficult.
“The issue is — and it is quite a simplistic one — when they were voted in, you weren’t getting enough time to work on it.
“I understand that it could have been used and seen as a focal point to have a look at the new rules and how they play out but unless you had all your players all of the time, it was going to be very, very difficult to implement it in that four or five-week period.
“It is unfortunate, but I think it is the right way to go and not have the new rules. Let them bed in, see how they go at county level and in a year’s time things will be very different.”
One positive change in 2025 that will potentially help bolster the Sigerson Cup is the fact that inter-county pre-season tournaments such as the McKenna Cup are no longer in action.
In previous years, the colleges would have players representing them in a midweek game only for the same players to be used for their counties at the weekend, and it was an arduous balancing act.
More importantly though, it should bring more eyes to the competition and give it the respect that it deserves.
Deegan concluded: “We will have to fill the hours somehow. Most of the matches are on a Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday, it’s in the middle of winter, so it should have a good focus on it.
“It tends to be more open than county level has been in recent years, you will be watching a game with a lot of high quality players on show and the uniqueness of it comes from within because you have so many players together from so many different counties.”
Sigerson Cup Round 1: Tuesday, January 7 (7pm): TUS Midlands v Maynooth, ATU Sligo v Ulster University, TU Dublin v University of Galway, UCC v UCD. Wednesday, January 8 (7pm): ATU Dublin v MTU Cork, ATU Galway v University of Limerick, St Mary’s v QUB, DCU De v MTU Kerry.