Never has such a collection of silverware been brought through the door of a primary school in the space of a few months, as has been the case in Two Mile CNS since September. We greeted our neighbours, David and Paudie Clifford, holding the Sam Maguire aloft in the afterglow of the All-Ireland final.
If you are one of the 189K who have viewed this occasion on Instagram, this may be old news. However, they followed up with a visit to Two Mile in November bringing the Tom Keane Memorial Cup, awarded to Fossa as Kerry Junior Football Champions.
For a small school, a quick search of our past pupil records yields a fair share local heroes: Paudie Clifford, David Clifford, Fintan Coffey, Shane O’Sullivan, Colin Myers, Pádraig Devane, Mossy Prendeville, Kevin Myers, Shane Kelly and Eddie Myers. Staff and pupils were struck by their obvious pride in visiting their old primary school on the historic occasion of winning the Kerry Junior Championship. Wide –eyed children listened as players and management spoke of commitment, hard work, dedication, practice and pride in the Black and Red jersey. And their most important message? Dream big!!! One day you could be playing for Fossa or for Kerry and it all starts at your age in the local club!
As we partly suspected that day, they would be back again. And back they came on a frosty day in January with yet another trophy, this time as All Ireland Junior Club Champions! As they posed for photos with their heroes, the message that the pupils heard was consistent: pride in the locality and dedication to the cause.
We are very grateful to our local heroes for their interest in our school and for taking the time to share their achievements with us. No doubt we will see some of our present pupils lining out in Black and Red in years to come. Up Fossa!