Offaly Senior Hurling Championship 2013

[KillougheyGoBragh]

Molloy Environmental Systems SH Semi Final Draws
St Rynagh's v Birr,
KK v Seir Kieran

Via twitter from Mary Dunne.

[Plain of the Herbs]

We do live in interesting times.

IHC draw is -
Ballinamere v Shamrocks;
Kilcormac-Killoughey v Ballyskenagh-Killavilla

JHC draw is -

Seir Kieran v Crinkill;
Kilcormac-Killoughey v Edenderry

You gotta hand it to Clareen, outside of K-K, they are the only club to have two teams still in championships.

[Bord na Mona man]

The Shirone game plan was to get the ball into their forwards fast and early. so their backs hit everything straight in on top of the Birr Full back line and Paul Cleary won it, use it and set up attack after attack which normal end up with a Birr forward hitting a bad wide. I'm not joking the Shirone Full forward are not big, tall lads and in the second half i counted the number of cross field balls the shirone backs delivery to their full forward line in the second half. The number was Zero. The Shirone backs never gave there forwards a chance.

Arra, forwards love quick ball. Lash it up to them any way you can. So long as it's quick!
Get lads to practice with a live hand grenade instead of a sliotar and they'll learn to deliver it even quicker.

[Plain of the Herbs]

Apparently the SHC semi-finals are being brought forward a week to Sunday 15th September 2013 having initially scheduled for the following weekend. The Master Fitures list has now been taken down from the County Board site.

By my calculation, Sunday 15th September is the first day Stephen Quirke becomes eligible to line out for his club following the expiration of his US sanction, a sanction which was approved on 16th July.

The rule reads "A player who has received a sanction shall not be eligible to play again with his Club in Ireland for the 60 days after the date of approval of his sanction in Croke Park, but is eligible to play with his County."

Sure cuts it fine.

[Bord na Mona man]

Apparently the SHC semi-finals are being brought forward a week to Sunday 15th September 2013 having initially scheduled for the following weekend. The Master Fitures list has now been taken down from the County Board site.

By my calculation, Sunday 15th September is the first day Stephen Quirke becomes eligible to line out for his club following the expiration of his US sanction, a sanction which was approved on 16th July.

The rule reads "A player who has received a sanction shall not be eligible to play again with his Club in Ireland for the 60 days after the date of approval of his sanction in Croke Park, but is eligible to play with his County."

Sure cuts it fine.

Such fine margins put John Waters in jail...

[Plain of the Herbs]

Going by the scoreline, the Clareen v Coolderry MHC quarter-final sounds like a real belter. Level after 60 minutes (SK 1-20 Cúl 3-14), Clareen won in extra time 3-25 to 3-16.

Clareen have beaten Coolderry at the quarter-final stage at Senior, Minor and U21 this year!

[alltheway]

Clareen Og, which POTH, as I have asked you wont refer to them as, considering 9 Drumcullen players started the first period of extra time for Clareen Og, but then again you rarely refer to Drumcullen in anything other than negative terms, were the better team over the course of what was indeed a cracking game. Clareen Og looked to be coasting midway through the second half having done the better hurling, but Coolderry made some changes to their forward unit and scored a goal against the run of play and built on that with some fine points although there were some questionable decisions at best given by Martin Kirwan. Light was fading badly when extra time was eventually called. Padraic Guinan really made extra time winning frees and scoring 3 fine points in that period as well as being the link man to all good play in the forward line. Shaun Dunne took some fine scores throughout the 80 mins and was very effective all night. Shane Ryam was well marshalled, Colm Gath got a fine goal and 2 or 3 points upon coming on at half time. Joseph McCarthy, Barry Kinsella and Packie Mulrooney were excellent when needed at the back. For Coolderry, a young team, I counted 5 for definite who are u16 again next year, and have the basis of a very strong team were served very well by Will Malone in goals, Chris Molloy put in a fine day at midfield, Daniel Miller looked lively everytime the ball weny in although he was well marshalled. Their number 12, Chris, his second name eludes me, had a huge game and took the game to them at all stages, worked tirelessly and took some nice scores and ran strongly at goal. All in all, a great evenings entertainment in a dusky Clareen.

[puzzled]

Big game at the wrong end of things tomorrow evening in Birr.

Kinnitty won one group game beating Lusmagh in the first round,they have performed well enough in their group games and have not taken any major beatings,the performances of James Rigney Colm Coughlan and Shane Kinsella will have major influence on the out come.
Drumcullen have gone through the group without winning any game with their best performance coming in the first game against Tullamore,but its interesting that three of the semi-finalists have come from group one,perhaps Drumcullens group was the harder of the two. Drumcullen need Harry Ryan and a few more to stand up to the challenge and take the burden off of Conor Gath because he alone wont be able to beat kinnitty.

I am going to go for a surprise here and predict a Drumcullen victory but only just and this game wont be one for the faint hearted.
Declan Cooke could have his hands full!

[King Kev]

Kinnitty to win by ten points minimum.

[Toxicity234]

Relegation Semi Final FT: @KinnittyGaa 1-24 @Drumcullen_GAA 1-10. Kinnitty retain senior status for next year.

[The Bogman]

The Drummies are surely favourites to go down? Conor Gath will be a massive loss to them after getting a straight red against Kinnitty

[GreatDayForTheParish]

Drumcullen getting a red card?
Shocking.

[Plain of the Herbs]

I kept a tally of the number of frees conceded by Drumcullen yesterday evening, because I thought they conceded very few frees against Birr. I counted six free conceded by Drumcullen the whole match and two of them were for fouls on the ball (there was a pick-up and a ‘steps’). Drumcullen were shown not a single yellow card. Just four of Kinnitty’s 24 points came from frees. Drumcullen themselves were awarded 14 frees over the hour, the worst of which was for James Rigney’s thundering frontal charge on Pádraic Guinan.

Conor Gath’s was a moment of madness, he’d been held by Christopher Leonard and lashed out by striking the Kinnitty man across the head. Declan Cooke had no hesitation in reaching for his red card. It was a pity because I thought Drumcullen made a big effort to get their tackling right. Id didn’t affect the result as a spurt after half-time (during which James Rigney played his best hurling) Kinnitty led well at the time of the sending-off (around 40 minutes).

Kinnitty played some delightful, quick hurling. They supported each other well, used some good combination play and very often worked the ball from one end of the field to the other with good stickpassing moves, playing the ball in front of the recipient giving them the best chance of gaining possession.

Offaly’s number one goalkeeper scored five points from corner-forward. Seánie Carroll scored the Kinnitty goal shortly before half-time, sealing the win and Kinnitty were never going to be overtaken when they led 1-11 to 0-7 at half-time.

Kinnitty’s number one goalkeeper made one stunning save from Damien Spain, and gave a competent display of handling and an astute use of possession in slippery conditions. Odhrán Kealey scored 0-7, Christopher Leonard did alot of good work on the right side of midfield. The corner-back with the yellow helmet got out first to every Drumcullen delivery. Kinnitty survive. Drumcullen, for whom Shane Molloy goaled with almost the last puck, enter the last chance saloon.

Scorers: Kinnitty: Odhrán Kealey 0-7, James Dempsey 0-5, Colm Coughlan 0-5 (4 frees), Seánie Carroll 1-1, Christopher Leonard 0-2, Mark Robinson, James Rigney & 2 others got 0-1 each (I didn’t get the identity of Kinnitty’s last 2 scores, possibly Keith Bergin and Mark Delaney?).
Drumcullen: Conor Gath 0-6 (5 frees), Shane Molloy 1-2 (0-2 frees), Damien Spain & John Cashin 0-1 each.

[Plain of the Herbs]

Next weekend’s fixtures are up –

Saturday 14th –
SHC relegation semi-final, Lusmagh v Brosna Gaels in Birr at 5pm,

IHC semi-finals (double header at O’Connor Park)
Ballinamere v Shamrocks at 4pm,
Ballyskenagh-Killavilla v Kilcormac-Killoughey at 5.30pm


Sunday 15th –
SHC semi-finals (double header at O’Connor Park)
Birr v St Rynagh’s at 3pm
Kilcormac-Killoughey v Seir Kieran at 4.30pm


Saturday 21st –
JHC semi-finals
Seir Kieran v Crinkill at Birr at 2pm
Kilcormac-Killoughey v Edenderry in Tullamore at 3.30pm

[KingKobra]

Birr V St.Rynaghs

You'd have to fancy Birr here mainly because of how poor Rynaghs are, very lucky to be in a semi-final honestly not giving them a hope here depleted from last year. Birr were impressive against Shinrone went about there business in a procession like manner. Rynaghs are are different opposition and will play a more traditional game than Shinrone. Expecting Rory Hanniffy, Dylan Hayden and Paul Cleary to dominate and ultimately be the difference for Birr.
Birr win by 5.

KK v SK

Simple stop Joe Bergin = stop SK.
KK win by 6, but still struggling to keep tabs on Bergin all the same.