Minor A's Into Final
The Minor A team played their semi final of the championship on Sunday 24th October 2010 against Castleknock at O'Toole Park in Crumlin.
It was a fine cold morning and the match was very competitive from the off with Crokes slow to settle. Castleknock were the first to score with a point which they soon followed up with a wonderful goal from Ciaran Kilkenny from an overhead pull. It was a goal which would grace any venue. Crokes now responded immediately with a point from Jonathan Healy Hayes which was soon followed up by a goal from Alex Pilkington. Crokes then hit the front due to the sterling work of the half back line with Enda Grogan to the fore and had four unanswered points, three from frees by Ken Kelly, and then Oisin O’Rorke stepped in with a great goal to put Crokes 2-6 to 1-2 clear by the nineteenth minute. It was tit for tat for the remainder of the first half with Jude Sweeney pointing twice, Mark O'Dwyer and Ken again to make the half time score 2-10 to 1-7.
Crokes knew that Castleknock would come out with all guns blazing and so they did. We were on the back foot from the off with three unanswered scores for Castleknock but then Ken Kelly struck another free to steady the ship. However Castleknock hit back again and due to the bravery of Sean Garvey they didn’t score another goal but they kept adding the points. After 50 minutes Castleknock hit the front. Now it was time to see what this Kilmacud Crokes team was made of. It was hard fought with our backs defending like mad men with Conor Devins to the fore and finally the siege was lifted with Jude equalising in the last minute of normal time. Five minutes of added times were still to go with all to play for but Crokes were down to 14 men due to indiscipline. Ken stepped up again to put us in front and from the puck out Mark O'Dwyer went high to collect and feed Jude who put us two points ahead. Again Castleknock came at us and went for goal but Robert Murphy and Stephen Beale were equal to the task and finally the referee, Dave O'Donovan, who was excellent throughout, sounded the final whistle. Final score Crokes 2-17 Castleknock1-19.
This now puts us in the final against Ballyboden on the 24th of October.
Team: Sean Garvey, Stephen Beale, Robert Murphy, Conor Devins, James O’Keeffe, Enda Grogan, Gary Melican, Dillon Mulligan, Mark O’Dwyer, Ken Kelly, Jude Sweeney, Tom Clarke, Oisin O'Rorke, Jonathan Healy Hayes, Alex Pilkington Subs: Louis Whelan for James O'Keeffe, Matthew Geraghty for Jonathan Healy Hayes, Justin Cassidy, Ross McGowan, Sean Boyd, Karl Russell.
Scorers: Ken Kelly 0–9 (7f &1 65), Jude Sweeney 0-4, Alex Pilkington 1-1 Oisin O’Rorke 1-0, Mark O'Dwyer 0–2 and Jonathan Healy Hayes 0-1.