Charleville fail to finish the job

Charleville 1-9 Courcey Rovers 0-12

CHARLEVILLE and Courcey Rovers will need to do it all again in next Monday for a place in Cork senior hurling after playing to a stalemate last Sunday afternoon.

Based on the manner with which both sides made their way through the championship and into the show-piece game it was no surprise that this fixture was billed as one of the most eagerly awaited intermediate hurling finals in quite a while, but finals have a habit of stifling creativity and fluidity and last Sunday was a perfect example of that.

Right from the off it was clear that this game was unlikely to be what many punters were predicting as nerves and poor shooting dominated both sides.

For Charleville hard to look past Darragh Fitzgibbon as the marquee player, but with the likes of Captain Danny O’Flynn, Mark Kavanagh, Tim Hawe and Alan Dennehy there was enough class on show for the neutrals to get their teeth into.

Jack O’Callaghan, Jack Buckley, Andrew Cagney and Jack Doyle were another quartet that were sure to have an influence and while all did their bit none were able to make the stand-out intervention that was needed on the day.

For Courceys, Tadgh O’Sullivan was always likely to be the key man with Killian Moloney, Seán Twomey and David Duggan all predicted to have a major say and as predicted delivered in spades.

From the first whistle Charleville looked the stronger side with Cork star Fitzgibbon leading the charge from his roaming berth in the middle third.

The inter-county player was on the ball more often than not in the opening few minutes and had a couple of early pops at the post but all to no avail before squaring up the tie on six minutes with his side’s first point after Killian Moloney had scored first for Courceys.

Fitzgibbon’s first score gave a clear indication that the he was up for the game and when he bagged the game’s only goal on 21 minutes it looked as if the midfielder was going to be on the winning side, but Courceys stuck with their opponents and trailed by just three at the turn 1-4 to 0-4.

The second half was a little more entertaining than the first however at no stage did the commitment levels drop from either side.

O’Sullivan bagged eight points in total (five in the second half) and the last two scores of the game as his side outscored Charleville by eight to five to secure what was a fair enough draw at the finish.

Poor shooting, poor decision making and a bag of nerves, that would have taken down most professional sports stars, really did conspire to trip up a Charleville side that are far better than they showed last Sunday.

Pre-game the Avondhu side looked to have everything on their side with the sun to their backs and a nice big pitch to show their wares but on the day things turned out a little differently.

The sixteen wides was obviously a factor and considering that was 11 more than the opposition it isn’t hard to work out that this was a telling factor – that said Charleville didn’t really deserve to win. Charleville had more ball but failed to deliver it to the areas that count enough times to make the difference – and because of that it is no surprise that Rovers could have stolen this one on the day.

Will Charleville live to rue the day? – only time will tell, but if they show the same way again this Monday be under no doubt they will rue that day.

CHARLEVILLE: C Collins; D Butler, J Meade, F Cagney; A Dennehy, J Buckley, C Carroll; J O’Callaghan, J Doyle 0-1; M Kavanagh 0-4 (0-3f), C Buckley, D Fitzgibbon 1-2; A Cagney, D O’Flynn (Capt) 0-1, T Hawe 0-1 Subs: J Kennedy for J O’Callaghan (bs 2324), PJ Copps for A Cagney (54), J Kennedy for T Hawe (55)

COURCEY Rovers: S Nyhan 0-1f; B Mulcahy, B Collins, B Mulcahy; D Lordan (Capt), D Duggan, S McCarthy; K Moloney 0-1, G Moloney; M O’Donovan, M Collins, J O’Neill; S Twomey 0-2, O Crowley, T O’Sullivan 0-8 (0-6f) Subs: J McCarthy for O Crowley (54), C Daly for G Moloney (58)

REFEREE: Mark Maher (St Finbarrs)