St Michael’s College will begin this year’s MacRory Cup campaign in Carrickmore on Tuesday with a 12pm throw-in.

The Enniskillen school face St Patrick’s Maghera in their opening group game and are expecting a difficult test against the Derry side.

MacRory coach and teacher Peter Teague has a 34-man squad, at the moment, with more players expected to join after the school’s Rannafast run concludes.

They will also face St Patrick’s Cavan and St Ronan’s of Lurgan in the group. “I done a year in St Ronan’s, in Lurgan, teaching, so I would know quite a few of their players,” Teague said earlier this week.

“They done well last year them lads with Armagh minors getting to an All-Ireland final getting beat by Derry, there were a lot of players on that minor team that were involved.

"They’ll be bringing plenty of experience to the plate in that regard. They have a few very good, tidy players. Maghera, their backboned by several of the Derry minors that have won back-to-back All-Ireland minors this last two years, so, you can tell what they’ll be like.

"They will be a formidable outfit as they always are and St Pat’s Cavan are a wee bit of the unknown, don’t know too much about them, to be honest. Ill probably have to do some research on them.

"We’re playing Maghera first, so we’ll see how the other result goes.”

This year’s competition has seen three new teams added, taking the total number of sides to 18.

“I think it is a positive because everybody’s guaranteed a knock-out game, whereas, in the past few years, if you finished bottom you were dumped out essentially,” added Teague.

"We were in that position last year, we were in a tough group with Magherafelt and Dungannon.

"Dungannon got to the MacRory final, Magherafelt got beat by a point by Omagh CBS in the semi-final, and we drew our other game with St Colmans.

"It was a very tough group we were in and with the club scene going until the first week of November last year, it was difficult to get any real momentum built up, that was a huge disadvantage last year.

"But, now that you are guaranteed a knock-out game, in the middle of December, at least you know that before a ball is thrown in.”

St Michael’s stomached an early exit last year with a draw and two losses from their three group games.

“There will be learnings to take from last year, it was three very tough games, we probably should have won our very first game in Clones last year against St Colmans, conceded a penalty at the very end.

"They got a draw out of it and then we lost against two very good sides in St Patricks Dungannon and St Mary’s Magherafelt. You seen how well Omagh done, winning the All-Ireland at a canter, you can see how competitive Ulster is.

"It’s great for our lads to be exposed to that level of football that you don’t get anywhere else and they can see what it takes to get up to that level.

"The likes of Conor Mulligan, our captain, and Mattie McDermott, our vice-captain, who have been in since fifth year, it’s great to see their development and they are in their final year now. You can see the development they have made the past couple of years. It’s been great to see.”

Teague is in his third since joining the school and taking over the reins of the MacRory squad from Dom Corrigan: “I’ve loved it, I’m very privileged to be in the position I am in, leading the St Michael’s MacRory Cup team.

"With the history that it has in the competition down through the years with great men like Dom Corrigan and Peter McGinnity of the past years and other men that haven't been mentioned there.

"There’s been serious work at putting St Michael’s College and Fermanagh football up at that top level and the crème de la crème of Ulster football. Hopefully, I'll be no different and I aim to achieve that in the foreseeable future.”