County Senior Football Championship Round 4: St. Kieran's 2.8 Newcastlewest 1.12
The senior footballers made the short journey to the Bog Garden Rathkeale, a ground that has been a happy hunting ground for us over the past number of campaigns with optimism on Saturday evening as they sought a fourth straight victory and a passage into the county semi final. Standing in their way were local rivals Newcastlewest who were coming off a victorious west championship campaign and a narrow victory over Adare in the last round to compliment their round 2 victory over Galbally. We came into the game on the back of an eight point win over Galbally which was an excellently confidence booster in the aftermath of a disappointing west final performance. Played in glorious conditions in front of a large attendance, in no small part due to the intense and fierce rivalry built up between the two sides in the recent weeks, the game began at a frantic pace with the Newcastlewest forwards showing intent early on taking an early lead before Johnny McCarthy, operating at wing back drove through the heart of the Newcastlewest defence to tie up the game. Up front Newcastlewest's forwards looked particularly lively while they showed great support play further back the field which we found difficult to deal with early on. We could have suffered a major early blow were it not for a fine save from Patrick Histon between the posts who closed down the space to deny James Kelly an early goal. Alas we were not so lucky a few moments later as Newcastlewest upped the ante and capitalized on a number of mistakes on our part to cut throw the right hand side of our defence and coolly work the ball across the square before finishing it off into the back of the net and taking control of the game. While we could have easily capitulated from here the lads never dropped their heads and fought hard to get back into the game. John Doyle was performing well around the middle third and his strong run's along with those of Johnny McCarthy were causing a lot of problems for the Newcastlewest defence as we soon got ourselves back into the game and reduced the deficit with scores from Sean McSweeney. The manner of the first half fightback was extremely pleasing considering that this team has come in for a lot of criticism in the past number of weeks with each player standing up to the mark throughout the hour. As the second half began we needed to get on the score-sheet early if we were to get back into the game. We dominated possession in the opening ten minutes or so but we failed to make the most of our opportunities as we kicked a number of wide's while Newcastlewest appeared to be more ruthless and clinical in front of goal and capitalized on our wayward shooting. Up front we continued to work hard in the absence of Timmy Carroll who had a reoccurrence of a long term injury just before half time to be ably replaced by John O' Connor before we lost another man through injury in Diarmuid Crowley at the half time break. The forwards continued to press on with both Jack Harnett and Ray Cahill in the half forward line doing an amount of work securing possession while Anthony Molyneaux operating a bit deeper picked up a huge quantity of possession and duly punished the defence to get us back into the game. Niall O' Shea soon made the most of his second half introduction when he found the back of the Newcastlewest net as the game now hung in the balance as was there for either side. We continued to pour forward but alas we could not bridge the gap, two further scores from John Doyle and Sean McSweeney kept us in the game but to be fair our opponents looked that bit more clinical in the scoring areas and made the most of their chances. At the final whistle we came up short by the narrowest of margins but to the players credit they put in a savage performance a vast improvement on the west final performance. We suffered a number of setbacks during the game with injuries losing three players during the hour added to the four players we were short going into the game due to injury. We now go into the final round game facing a number of permutations. We currently have six points along with Newcastlewest, while Fr. Casey's sit on top of the group with eight points, while Ballysteen remain outside the qualification positions with four points. In the final round we meet Fr. Casey's where a win or draw would secure a quarter final spot while Newcastlewest meet Ballysteen. If Ballysteen beat Newcastlewest and we fail to get a result with Fr. Casey's then the final place in the quarter finals will come down to score difference.
Team vs. Newcastlewest
Patrick Histon, Brendan McCarthy, Paudie McCarthy, Mossie Shine, Diarmuid Crowley, Diarmuid Carroll, Johnny McCarthy, Mike Flynn, John Doyle, Jack Harnett, Anthony Molyneaux, Ray Cahill, Sean McSweeney, Timmy Carroll, Donie Nolan, John O' Connor, Niall O' Shea, Shane Lynch, Tommy Quinn, James O' Connor, James Morrisroe, Aengus Gannon, Mike Enright, James Hough,

SFC Group 1 P W D L F A diff Pts
Fr Casey's 4 4 0 0 3-46 0-31 24 8
Newcastlewest 4 3 0 1 3-57 4-37 17 6
St Kierans 4 3 0 1 4-47 3-35 15 6
Ballysteen 4 2 0 2 4-41 3-34 10 4
Adare 4 0 0 4 2-33 5-53 -29 0
Galbally 4 0 0 4 3-29 4-63 -37 0

County Intermediate Hurling Championship:
Round four for the intermediate hurling championship takes place this Sunday evening where we face a mouth-watering encounter against east Limerick side Cappamore. A very similar side to us, Cappamore came up from the Junior ranks in 2011 and have been hugely competitive during their tenure in the intermediate championship. When the two sides met in the county league last year there was no separating the two sides in Coolcappagh as we shared the spoils. No doubt there will be very little between the two sides on Sunday evening with the winner taking a huge step towards advancing into the knockouts stages. The game throws in at 6.45 in Clarina.

IHC Group 2 P W D L F A diff Pts
Pallasgreen 3 3 0 0 5-47 4-32 18 6
Monaleen 3 2 0 1 6-44 2-36 20 4
St Kierans 3 2 0 1 2-37 4-28  3 4
Cappamore 3 2 0 1 2-41 2-38  3 4
Kileedy 3 0 0 3 3-25 5-46 -27 0
Kildimo Pallaskenry 3 0 0 3 4-36 5-44 -17 0

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