Under 15 Hurlers – Scrape through to land Historic Championship Title

Date of Match: 5th November 2006

Versus: Naomh Fionnbarra Venue: O’Toole Park

Competition: Under 15 Championship Final

Management Team: Pat Halpin, Tom Murphy, Daibhi dePaor, Gearoid O’Riain

Match Result
Crokes 0 - 10 v Naomh Fionnbarra 2 - 03

Scorers;
Crokes: Seanie McGrath (0-04 (0-01 f)), Jamie O’Sullivan (0 – 03 (0-01 f, 0-01 65)),Eddie O’Byrne (0 – 01), Killian Doherty (0-01) & Mark O’Dwyer (0 – 01)

Match Report/ Match Highlights:

Under 15 Hurlers – Scrape through to land Championship Title

It was a bright Sunday morning and finally it was time to play the Dublin Under 15 Hurling Championship final. Having qualified for the final by beating Kevins on the 27th August 2006, it has been a long time coming. In the ten weeks since the semi final victory, the lads have played only two games as a team, the last one being four weeks ago against a depleted Erins Isle side, not ideal preparation for a final. Despite numerous attempts, it had proved impossible to arrange suitable challenge games. A soft, long grassed O’Toole Park was the venue and a tough determined Naomh Fionnbarra were the opponents, who had beaten St Vincents in the Championship semi final replay with an emphatic scoreline of 6 – 07 to 1 – 06.

Crokes started with the breeze and started well. Jamie opened the scoring with a well taken point in the first minute. Five minutes later, Jamie extended the lead with a converted 65 meter free. Two minutes later Seanie extended the lead even further after converting a free 30 meters out. Fionnbarrs were hunting in packs and were giving the Crokes lads no time or space on the ball. However, eighteen minutes into the game and Seanie hit a purple patch and knocked over two points in a minute to extend Crokes lead to 5 points to no score. Fionnbarrs had to wait until te 21st minute of the half before registering their first score, a long range free from their center back. In the dying seconds of the half, Eddie finished the scoring in the half with a great individual point, leaving Crokes leading 6 points to 1 point at the break.

Despite the lead, the Crokes management were not happy, Crokes hit over 12 wides in the first period and failed to convert a number of goal opportunities. The lads were told that they would have to up their game if they wanted to win the game.

As predicted, Fionnbarrs started strongly in the second half and using the breeze, rained ball after ball into their forward line. After 3 minutes they converted a short range free. But the Crokes defense stood firm and rebuffed attack after attack. Unfortunately, 6 minutes into the second half, Eddie aggravated an ankle injury and had to be replaced by Louis and this took a bit of the fix out of Croke’s midfield. It was dogged hurling at this stage, the pitch didn’t help, but there was little free flowing hurling. Thanks to some poor free taking on Fionnbarrs behalf, they had to wait until the 15th minute of the half to score again. This time, following some uncharacteristic sloppy defending, the ball popped loose and it was buried into the back of the Crokes net. Crokes lead was now a solitary point. This score seemed to galvanise the Crokes players. Three minutes later, the ball pooped loose on the 14 yard line, Killian Doherty pulled first time and struck it over the bar, a great point that could well have been a goal. 6 minutes later, Mark gathered the ball on the left wing, after Louis had made a great clearance and he struck it straight over the bar to extend Crokes lead to 3 points. However, almost straight from the puck out, a long range ball from the Fionnbarrs midfield ended up in the back of the Crokes net, level scores and Fionnbarrs seemed to have the advantage. Two minutes later, up popped Seanie and he scored a great point, to put Crokes back into the lead. Fionnbarrs were piling on the pressure and on the stroke of full time, they won and converted a 65 meter free, the game had all the signs of heading into extra time. Two minutes into added time and Fionnbarrs were awarded a free 55 meters out, dead center in front of the Crokes goal, following a marvelous Matthew Kinsella clearance, no one knew why but the game looked over. But unexpectly, the free was sent wide and Crokes were still in it. A minute later, Crokes won a free 50 meters out on the right wing, this surely was the chance that Crokes needed. As Jamie stood over the ball, taking his time, there was an auditable silence from both sets of supporters, Jamie calmly picked the ball and to the groans of the Fionnbarrs crowd, drove it straight over the black spot, a marvelous score under pressure. Following the puck out, the referee blew the whistle and Crokes had captured their first Under 15 Division 1 Championship crown, another first for this talented panel of players.

In the end Crokes ran out winners with a 0-10 to 2-03 margin. While not the best performance this team has produced, they still showed plenty of character to drag this victory out of the fire. Well done to all the lads, this Championship was the target set at the beginning of the year and it was achieved. Thanks to all the parents and supporters who attended the game, it means a lot to the players. A special thanks goes to Jamie O'Sullivan, who played his last game with us on Sunday, Jamie has now moved to Kerry, best of luck to him and hopefully we'll see him back in a Crokes jersey sometime soon.

Kilmacud Crokes:
Barry Mulligan, Cian O’Brien, Jack Kelly, Jack Doughan, Paul Collins, Bill O’Carroll, Alan Carr, Matthew Kinsella, Eddie O’Byrne, Killian Doherty, Jamie O’Sullivan, Sean Murphy, Seanie McGrath, Naomhan O’Reardon, Mark O’Dwyer.

Subs: Jude Sweeney for Sean Murphy, Louis Whelan for Eddie O’Byrne.

Subs not Used: - Brendan Halpin, Cillian Casey, Dillon Mulligan, Eoin Dalton, Hugh Byrne, Johnny Brew, Keith Hogarty, Peter McCague

Unavailable: - Darren McVeigh due to injury.