Ballyhale Shamrocks 1-16 Ballygunner 0-16
Having only ever lost three All-Ireland series games in their 50-year history, there was a curiosity to Ballyhale Shamrocks being underdogs ahead of this Ballygunner rematch.
There was a 20-year gap between the first two losses and then 13 years between the defeat to Portumna in 2009 and last February’s final, when Harry Ruddle’s last gasp goal dramatically secured a first ever title for Ballygunner.
The consensus was that the perennial Waterford champions had kicked on in the meantime while Ballyhale were stagnant at best.
However, since re-emerging as the pre-eminent power in Kilkenny in 2018, that All-Ireland final earlier this year is the only game of consequence that they’ve lost and it was clear from their manager Pat Hoban that they were stung by the doubts that hung over them.
“There was a lot of questions about this team,” he said, “lot of people maybe felt they weren’t at the level, they were slipping, felt we hadn’t a panel, felt we hadn’t the fitness - I think today we had two guys off after 15 minutes, we proved we have a panel, we proved we had subs and we proved that we’re good enough to be in an All-Ireland final.”
On the back of what Hoban acknowledged was one of the club’s sweetest victories yet, they’ll regain the favourites’ tag for the final against Dunloy on the weekend of January 21/22, when they bid for a record-extending ninth All-Ireland title.
It wasn’t quite Ballyhale at their swashbuckling best but they shut down an out of sorts Ballygunner for the most part and but for the brilliance of goalkeeper Stephen O’Keeffe they would have won far more comfortably.
The Shamrocks started with intent and hit the first three points inside three minutes though they lost Darren Mullen and Joey Cuddihy to injury early on and Ballygunner seemed to have settled by the 15-minute mark as they pushed 0-7 to 0-5 in front.
“The reality is we needed our half-forward line to work harder, they were winning all the breaks,” said Hoban. “Once we got on top on the breaks we got to grips with their movement then.”
By half-time it was 0-11 each, with O’Keeffe having already denied Adrian Mullen twice with fine saves.
The quality of the fare dropped on the restart as both attacks struggled to make inroads and respective centre-forwards TJ Reid and Pauric Mahony not as influential as might be expected.
But when Eoin Cody replied to a Mahony free with two points from play, Ballyhale were back in front and weren’t led from there to the finish.
Again, O’Keeffe was called upon to deny Evan Shefflin and he saved his best stop of the afternoon for the 47th minute as he brilliantly blocked Reid’s penalty after Philip Mahony had taken Colin Fennelly down.
However, two minutes later he was facing another penalty as Shane O’Sullivan tripped Reid with the goal at his mercy but O’Keeffe’s heroics were spent by now as the net rippled and Ballyhale went four points clear.
With Reid finishing strongly, Joey Holden lording it at the back, Ballygunner struggling to get enough ball into the dangerous Dessie Hutchinson and teenage sensation Patrick Fitzgerald well held, they saw it out fairly comfortably from there.
“I give Stephen O’Keeffe fantastic praise for the saves he pulled off,” Hoban added. “We were very conscious of it, when the guys got in, keep the ball low. Didn’t matter - he pulled off great saves but it made it scary, three points (up) from the last play, you might have heard me shouting, ‘Remember February!’
“It was a bit like that, you’re always fearful that something might just go wrong but they held out well.”
Ballygunner boss Darragh O’Sullivan described the losing dressing room as “gutted, sick, very disappointed”.
“That's the nature of sport, some days you have fabulous days, last time here an unbelievable day,” he said. “No one will ever take that from us.
“We came here as All-Ireland champions, lost our title today but years back we were dreaming and we did get that All-Ireland title. We'll be back, the age profile of that team is young, 10 are U-26 and younger, a lot of young lads coming. We'll be back.”
He rejected any suggestion that his side were drained after so many lengthy campaigns.
"Irrelevant. We just came up against a better team today, that's the way I'd read it. Look back and when we analyse it, they were stronger than us. Fair play to them.”
Fennelly had hinted at a lack of respect towards Ballyhale from Ballygunner in the aftermath of last February’s game, but O’Sullivan was gushing in his praise when acknowledging their durability.
"They are the ones that we look up to, the one we try to emulate. It is probably ingrained in them from an early age.
“Hurling is their game and they say, ‘Listen, what are we famous for? Well we're famous for hurling’.
“When you have that and you have kids growing up with that tradition it helps and that's what it is. It is ingrained in every single one of them.
“We're ingraining that in our young fellas coming through. We will be around for a while, we're going nowhere.”
BALLYHALE SHAMROCKS: D Mason; D Mullen, J Holden, K Corcoran; E Shefflin, R Reid, D Corcoran; R Corcoran (0-1), P Mullen (0-1); A Mullen (0-1), TJ Reid (1-8, 1-0 pen, 0-7f, 0-1 ‘65’), J Cuddihy (0-1); E Kenneally (0-1), C Fennelly (0-1), E Cody (0-2).
Subs: Brian Butler for D Mullen (6), N Shortall for Cuddihy (13), C Walsh for Kenneally (60+2).
BALLYGUNNER: S O’Keeffe; I Kenny, B Coughlan, T Foley; S O’Sullivan, Philip Mahony, R Power (0-1); C Sheahan (0-1), P Leavey; P Hogan, Pauric Mahony (0-6, 0-4f), M Mahony (0-1); Patrick Fitzgerald (0-2), D Hutchinson (0-4), K Mahony (0-1).
Subs: B O’Keeffe for M Mahony (49), H Ruddle for Fitzgerald (55).
REFEREE: L Gordon (Galway).
