DUBLIN SF FINAL ST BRIGID'S v KILMACUD CROKES:THESE ARE heady days for St Brigid's GAA – someone already christened it the Blanchardstown renaissance. Tomorrow in Parnell Park, their senior footballers take on Kilmacud Crokes in the Dublin county final, and in the curtain raiser, St Brigid's are also up against Cuala in the intermediate final.

Last month, St Brigid’s won the Dublin junior title for the first time since 1996, comfortably beating St Jude’s, although they were defeated in the Junior B final.

Still, if things work out as planned, they could win three of the four main Dublin football championship titles, all in the same year. Not bad for a club in one of the more traditionally remote areas of Dublin football.

The senior team’s march to tomorrow’s final has been particularly impressive, for several reasons. They’ve actually been playing in Division Two of the Dublin league this year, although having won 14 out of 14 games, are now guaranteed promotion.

Just last weekend they also beat a hotly-fancied St Oliver Plunkett’s/Eoghan Ruadh in the semi-final, limiting the Brogan brothers and co to a mere five points – while they themselves clocked up 1-9.

In fact, the St Brigid’s senior team are unbeaten all season, and Kilmacud Crokes, although marginal favourites, know they have a major battle on their hands.

When the clubs last met in the final, in 2003, St Brigid’s won by six points, claiming what remains their first and only Dublin senior county title.

That’s the flashy intro – yet scratch the surface a little and things aren’t quite as glittering.

Just last year, St Brigid’s hit something of a low point when their senior team was relegated to Division Two, finishing a last defeat to St Vincent’s with just 10 men. And further down the ranks, particularly at juvenile level, success has become harder to find, with a few teams struggling down in the lower divisions.

It’s all part of the challenge of a major suburban club. St Brigid’s fields about 50 teams across all age levels – from nursery to adult, in football, hurling, camogie, women’s football, and handball. It has a wide catchment area which includes not just Blanchardstown and Castleknock, but the greater Dublin 15 region. Nailing success across all levels is always a tricky balancing act.

“We’ve always been successful in the sense we’d be knocking at the door for county titles nearly every year, or expect to be in the shake-up,” says Fintan O’Sullivan, club chairman, who admits the underage success has become more stop-start. “It’s not as solid as it should be at say under-16 to under-18. Below that we’re beginning to get it right. But underage nearly always goes in cycles anyway. Otherwise the same club would win everything. But we won the county minor three years ago, and were beaten in the final the following year. They were two very good teams, and a lot of those players are coming through.”

During the 1990s, St Brigid’s produced a string of underage successes, winning, for example, four under-16 Dublin championships. More recently that sort of success has dried up, but the club has been addressing it. Long-serving club coach and former Meath midfielder Gerry McEntee, who managed the senior team to the Dublin title in 2003, along with Paddy Clarke, was recently appointed director of football, formalising his role of overseeing football coaching across all grades.

McEntee still has an input into the senior team, which is managed by Mark Byrne, but his chief role at St Brigid’s now is to boast the underage success: “We’ve got an excellent management structure now,” explains O’Sullivan. “Gerry McEntee is overseeing that, getting all the teams organised properly, and putting management systems in place.

“So in many ways the club is thriving. But you have to keep at it. I wouldn’t say it’s a struggle, but maybe a team that’s strong at the bottom is better than a team that’s stronger at the top.”

In other words, the true strength of a club isn’t necessarily their adult senior teams, but their juvenile underage teams – and St Brigid’s, like most clubs, are trying to get the balance right. They’ve got their share of players onto the Dublin county team in recent years, most notably Barry Cahill, Peadar Andrews, Kevin Bonner, but no one around Russell Park is resting on any laurels.

In the meantime, their opposition tomorrow, Kilmacud Crokes, have practically perfected the underage conveyer belt, and are also chasing their fourth senior title in seven years. Plus, the St Brigid’s-Crokes rivalry is intense – not just because of the north-south rivalry.

St Brigid’s beat them in 2003 to claim their first title, and since then lost the 2007 final to St Vincent’s. Their defensive record is outstanding (they’ve only conceded one goal in five championship matches, and that was a penalty, to St Jude’s), and if success is indeed cyclical, across all grades, then perhaps St Brigid’s’ time has come again.