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You are > Home > GAA: Champs bite back at Ardfert underdogs
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Thursday, September 09, 2004
GAA: Champs bite back at Ardfert underdogs
By: Paul Brennan
AIB County Senior Hurling Champoinship semi-final
Kilmoyley 4-10, St Brendans 3-9
THE stuff of champions? In some ways yes, in many ways no, but Kilmoyley are nonetheless through to their fourth County Senior Hurling Championship final in as many years – bidding to win their fourth consecutive title too – showing just why they are presently the county’s grandmasters of the game.
Consider the facts. The defending champions trailed by seven points approaching the half time break, and worse still, were being out-hurled in virtually every position across Austin Stack Park by a fired up, committed and disciplined St Brendans side.
Shane Brick – the undisputed stickmeister of the local game – didn’t score until the 27th minute of a game that by and large passed him by.
And Kilmoyley didn’t take the lead (or a stranglehold on the game) until the three-quarter stage and that only by virtue of a fortuitous goal. Not exactly the stuff of champions, right?
But then consider these facts. Trailing by seven points after 26 minutes, Kilmoyley still went in at the break just a goal adrift, and were level three minutes into the second half.
Shane Brick after taking 27 minutes to find his first score finished with 1-3 after his name, his goal a classic Brick strike from a 30-metre free.
Kilmoyley finished with eight players finding the score sheet to St Brendans six, and an injury-time penalty (that seemed harshly awarded) trimmed the losing margin from seven to four.
So, not quite the equivocal performance that a cursory glance might suggest from the Lerrig men and yet St Brendans will have trooped back to Ardfert knowing that they really could have dethroned the champions.
As is often the case, it was the exuberance of youth that set the early tempo with St Brendan’s young tyros starting fast and furious as they cut a swathe through the first half of a thrilling game, lifted more so by a vociferous and colourful crowd.
Two early John Egan frees lifted spirits on the field and in the stands as St Brendans combined a ferocious appetite with excellent stick work to make the champions look lethargic and ordinary.
Kilmoyley, with Shane Brick setting up Sean Fitzgerald for their opening score, gave a hint of what they are capable of but the Ardfert side were unimpressed and hurled on to a 0-5 to 0-2 lead, their fifth coming from Declan Wallace after a poor clearance from Sean Fitzgerald, which summed up Kilmoyley’s jumpy start.
If there was redemption for Kilmoyley it came from the imperious Maurice Murnane at midfield who almost single- handedly held the cause together, with half backs James McCarthy and Colin Harris also grafting well, while the main movement up front came from Tom Murnane in the corner.
By the 20 minute mark Kilmoyley were on level terms through the aforementioned Murnanes, but as soon as the champions got some composure about them they were hit for a double whammy.
If St Brendans first goal was opportunist – Darren Dineen getting the final touch to Shane Griffen’s high ball – then the second was sheer class. Three minutes after Dineen’s first goal, and just moments after Egan had put them 1-6 to 0-5 ahead, Dineen picked up Declan Wallace’s pass and from 30 metres crushed an unstoppable shot past Joe Walsh, sending his side seven points clear and the Ardfert supporters into raptures.
If there’s one thing champions can’t suffer it’s humiliation, and so Shane Brick’s first point and a superb Maurice Murnane goal, after he careered past two defenders and finished across Liam O’Connor’s goal, cut the margin to 2-6 to 1-6 by the break, and for all their apparent difficulties Kilmoyley were still just a score behind.
That score was soon converted when three minutes after the restart Ollie Diggin and Richard Gentleman combined to put Darren Young in for the equalising goal, and from there in there was a creeping sense of inevitability to it all.
Dineen whipped in a first-timer that Joe Walsh had to steer around the post but Egan dragged the ‘65’ wide as his first half accuracy began to desert him.
Indiscipline also began to creep into St Brendans game as Shane Griffin turned over a free due to retaliation, with Sean Flaherty picking up a booking when Griffin was the main offender.
Although Egan found the next score after a three-minute delay for tempers to settle, substitute Christy Walsh steered in Shane Brick’s sideline cut to give the champions the lead for the first time, 3-6 to 2-7.
St Brendans remained tenacious and through sheer hard work and with eight minutes left they were still very much in the match at 2-9 to 3-7 but then, as is usually the case, these things are decided by a twist of genius or audacity or both.
With the impressive Colin Harris drawing a foul a little under 30 metres from the St Brendans goal just left of centre Shane Brick came up to the mark and his body language simply said Goal. A wall won’t stop Brick when he senses a goal so eight Ardfert men with hurls had little chance.
Even at 4-7 to 2-9 the ghost was up for St Brendans so that by the time Eamon Corridan netted an injury-time penalty it was merely an exercise in reducing a gap that would have flattered Kilmoyley but which couldn’t have done justice to the experience and poise of a team still on course for a fourth consecutive county senior title. Teams:
Kilmoyley: J Walsh, B Harris, P Regan, I Brick, S Fitzgerald (0-1), J McCarthy, C Harris, M Murnane (1-3, 0-1f), J Murnane, O Diggin, S Brick (1-3, 1-2f), M Regan (0-1), R Gentleman (0-1), D Young (1-0), T Murnane (0-1). Subs: S Maunsell for J Murnane, C Walsh (1-0) for O Diggin, P Sullivan for M Regan, E Sheehy for C Harris.
St Brendans: L O’Connor, M Kearney, M Casey, D Dineen (2-0), B Blackwell, E Corridan (1-0 pen), B Flaherty, S Synott (0-1), C Flaherty, J P Leen, J Best, S Griffin, J Egan (0-6, 5f), S Flaherty (0-1), Declan Wallace (0-1). Subs: Damien Wallace for S Griffin, D Leen for Declan Wallace.
Referee: Ger Harrington (Cork)
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