GAA Snippets

Munster Club SFC Final
Nemo Rangers 1-10
Ballinacourty 1-7

Nemo Rangers' dominance of club affairs in Munster was embellished in Killarney on Sunday as they won their 14th senior title.

Full credit to Ballinacourty for a spirited display but at the end of the day Nemo rarely looked as if they would be at the receiving end of a shock defeat.

Over the years of championship success Nemo have learned to win games by best adapting to the prevailing conditions. Sunday was another of those days when the tactics required to play with the howling gale in the first half had to be jettisoned to play against it.

In the second=half clearly the target of the first half was to put scores on the board while that of the second half was to prevent the opposition doing likewise. Nemo were not found wanting in either department.

Inexplicitly Ballinacourty, having won the toss elected to play against the gale and found themselves in arrears by 1-7 to 0-1 at the break.

While it was clear that with the benefit of the elements that Ballinacourty would reduce the deficit but it was also felt that they had let themselves too much to do.

Nemo's experience on the line was emphasised by their halftime switches. They took off their goal scorer David Kearney, brought on an extra midfielder Brian Twomey and placed wing forward Dylan Mehigan as an extra defender.

Despite their best efforts Ballinacourty could not reduce the deficit below the three point's margin.

Nemo played the possession game to perfection, thereby denying Ballinacourty sufficient loose ball to launch sufficient attacks to threaten the Nemo defence.

This was an entertaining game played in very difficult conditions.

Full credit to both sides for their efforts and particularly to Nemo who showed themselves the true masters on the day.

How Ballinacourty will regret giving Nemo first advantage of the elements.

Leinster Club SFC Semi-Final
Tyrrellspass 1-7
Moorefield 0-7

Leinster champions Moorefield surrendered their title in controversial circumstances at Mullingar on Sunday.

Following the mass brawl at the end of their quarter-final clash with Dromard, Moorefield had two players suspended and then had to concede home advantage to Tyrrellspass as part of their punishment.

If Moorefield felt hard done by with those sanctions one wonders how they felt when in the 52nd minute a very dubious penalty was awarded against them.

With Tyrrellspass leading by only a single point the award of the penalty and the conversion of it by the games best player, Denis Glennon was the games real turning point.

Tyrrellspass just about deserved this win if only for the manner by which they defended their goal in the first half when faced by the almost gale like wind. That they reached half-time on level terms (0-3 apiece) gave them a great platform to go on and win the game and set up a final clash with Dublin's St Vincent's. Such was Moorefield's anger at the end of the game that it was no real surprise that an over jealous approach to the referee was made by some of their supporters. The Leinster Council are to carry out an investigation.

Cork Player's Protest Deteriorates

Relations between the County board and Cork's hurlers and footballers have dramatically deteriorated. As of last night both panels have effectively resigned from their respective inter-county set-ups.

A source stated that following the weekend's meeting of both panels 'the Cork players are officially unavailable to the hurling and football managers'.