Should we read a lot into two August eight-point wins?

FOR THOSE of you with a quirky interest in facts and figures, how about this for a coincidence as next Sunday’s Tom Doyle Supplies Senior football championship semi-finals loom large? When Shelmaliers met Starlights in a group game on August 11, they were comfortable 2-11 to 0-9 winners.

Seven days later, it was the turn of Kilanerin and St. Martin’s to lock horns and, strange though it may seem, the scoreline was exactly the same as the Intermediate holders were well on top.

On the face of it then, is there really a lot to preview in these games? After all, two eight-point victories no more than seven and six weeks earlier would suggest that these matches are foregone conclusions.

Kilanerin and Shelmaliers would appear to be hot favourites on that form, but will it be that straightforward? I’m not so sure.

As last year’s champions and runners-up respectively, it could be argued that both Starlights and St. Martin’s will have sufficient experience of the big occasion to step it up considerably next Sunday.

Then again, here’s another interesting aside: since the Shels won the Intermediate title in 2007, they have met the Enniscorthy town men five times and boast an impressive 5-0 record.

Group successes in 2008 (1-13 to 0-5) and 2014 (4-7 to 1-6) were followed by an extra-time quarter-final triumph in 2015 (1-19 to 2-14).

Last season they had one point to spare (1-13 to 2-9), and August’s victory underlined their recent dominance.

Looking at the ten-year record of Starlights, it only serves to highlight how their route to glory in 2017 was so remarkable.

In the nine campaigns beforehand, they didn’t contest even one semi-final, making two last eight exits in 2008 and 2015 respectively.

They were relegated in 2011, bounced back at the first attempt, but then found themselves just one step away from making the drop on two more occasions, in 2013 and 2016.

In terms of consistency, the Shelmaliers record is admirable. After wiping Kilmore out in the 2007 Intermediate decider, this will be their seventh semi-final, and they were quarter-finalists in the other three years.

Their one big problem may be a psychological one because, they have yet to make it to a final, despite coming very close in 2015 and 2017 in particular when it took replays before they bowed out to St. James’ and St. Martin’s respectively.

Prior to last month, Kilanerin only faced Sunday’s rivals in the championship once in recent times, with their paths not crossing with the same frequency given that both spent time in the Intermediate grade. St. Martin’s won that group game by 3-15 to 3-9 in 2013, the year of their sole outright Senior success.

After being relegated in 2009, they took the Intermediate title in 2011 and have gone on to be champions once, runners-up twice, semi-finalists twice, and quarter-finalists once.

As for Kilanerin, they last claimed the crown in 2008 and were beaten in the decider by Castletown two years later.

It took them three attempts to return to the top flight after being relegated in 2014 but, as is well known at this stage, the omens are good as their last two Intermediate successes in 1973 and 1992 were followed by Senior victories at the first attempt.

I guess next Sunday will tell us if the form guide is reliable, or if St. Martin’s and Starlights were holding something back in those defeats in August.

Will we have a repeat of their 2017 final meeting, though? I have my doubts.

FOOTNOTE: One of the most frustrating aspects of working in the local print media is that it takes a full seven days to correct an error, and it’s even more galling when the mistake is spotted just after the deadline.

And so it was that, on Monday evening of last week, when I was putting my records away for safe-keeping, I realised that I had done the Ferns St. Aidan’s Senior hurlers an unintended disservice by writing their sensational one-point quarter-final win over St. Martin’s in 2016 out of history.

Apologies for the oversight, which I’m attributing to a frazzled brain after a particularly tough weekend.