Football is the thing that unites everyone in the County Down village of 1,000 people but their life choices are their own, and the team's centre-half-forward is glad his work gives him a little bit of separation and perspective.

“The thing about us all minding sheep is only a bit of craic,” grins Paul Devlin, “and to be honest it is not too far wrong anyway”.

“It is a very rural area and football is the hub of a place.

My parents always had farms over the road. I'd have been out on them when I was younger but I never got to grips with it really.

“I am an electrical engineer, so I don't have much to do with farming or sheep. I would be different from a lot of the boys in that way!

“I live about a minute up the road from the football field but I work in Newry and it is good to get away from it.

“Other boys are living it day by day but I like to get away from it because sometimes you can get too bogged down and get down on yourself.

“I like to talk to other people about other things. The last thing I want to talk about is football.”

Devlin is one of the few Kilcoo players who has regularly committed to inter-county football and will return to Down again this year.

He turns 30 later this year and says he will be a long time retired so wants to wear the red and black jersey for as long as he can.

He is also getting married later this year. His fiancee, Orla, is from a few miles up the road in Castlewellan, so where will they live? Devlin is all smiles.

"Well it all depends if the woman is willing to move to the parish or not.

“I was joking to our chairman Terry O'Hanlon telling him, 'I don't think she wants to move out here' and you just get this look.

“Seriously though the club is everything to us boys and we like to be close by.”

As crunch time draws near, there is no getting away from how huge tomorrow's AIB All-Ireland club SFC final against Corofin will be for Kilcoo.

Luckily for the Down and newly crowned Ulster champions, they are hitting peak form at exactly the right time, so being outsiders against the Galway giants — who are chasing an historic three-in-a-row of All-Ireland titles — suits them perfectly.

After a few unconvincing performances in Down and the early rounds of Ulster, Kilcoo were underdogs going into the Ulster final against Naomh Conaill but produced their best display of the season to win a first provincial title.

Underdogs again in the All-Ireland semi-final against Ballyboden St Enda's, they were even better.

Devlin was one of the stand-out performers and felt “it was my best performance of the year to date”.

“It was good to get back to the top of my game and get a wee bit of confidence back into myself.

“I don't think Corofin will have the same hunger, the desire and the grit that we have.

“There are a lot of games we grind out. If we are in a game with five, 10 minutes to go you cannot back against us and a lot of people say that.

I know Corofin came back and drew the Galway final but Connacht was not as strong as it can be and maybe it's an advantage for us in that they haven't found out what their weaknesses are, whereas we have been tested in certain areas and come up trumps.

Corofin, winners of three of the last five All-Ireland titles, have dominated all those finals and are chasing history.

Curiously, it's a challenge that does not daunt Kilcoo at all.

Devlin continues: “you want to beat the best, don't you?

“I am happy it's Corofin because you really are testing yourself against maybe the best club side ever.

“Stopping them from a three-in-a-row would be some achievement, not something people would forget.”