GREEN FIELD FOODS SENIOR FOOTBALL CHAMPIONSHIP FINAL
Scotstown v Ballybay: Clones: Sunday October 7th @ 3.30pm
Sunday is the red letter day, the make or break day for the last 2 teams left standing in the 2018. Green Field Foods Monaghan senior football championship when reigning champions Scotstown and Ballybay face off to see who will have an historic year and who will experience the bitter taste of defeat and disappointment. Scotstown are appearing in their 6th senior championship final in a row and trying to complete a 4 in a row of titles, having won the blue riband of Monaghan football in 2015, 2016 and 2017, while Ballybay are appearing in their first final since 2012, the year when they last won the senior football championship. They have come close to making it through to the decider on a couple of occasions in the intervening years and none more so than last year when their semi-final against Scotstown went to a replay with the blues prevailing on day 2, after getting out of jail on day one when they looked down and out going into stoppage time, only to crash in two goals and salvage a draw to inflict further pain on Ballybay. The bitter memory of that day and of defeat last year will have been a motivating factor for Ballybay in this year's championship, but at the same time they cannot afford to dwell too much on anything from the past, but rather concentrate on the job in hand, which is to build on the momentum they have created during this year's series. Ballybay needed the back door to get through to the final this year after they lost out to Sunday's opposition back on September 9th in Clontibret, a single point separating them at the finish in a game where Ballybay created enough chances to win it and that too will have been a lesson that they will have learned and in subsequent games they showed proof that they had taken that lesson on board as they recorded victories over Truagh and then Clontibret in the semi-final to reach Sunday's decider. Scotstown on the other hand are in Sunday's decider with 3 straight victories, starting out with a 3 points victory over a highly fancied. Carrickmacross on day 1, followed by that one point victory over Ballybay to book their place in the semi-final where they accounted for Magheracloone.
PATHS TO THE FINAL
Scotstown:
Scotstown 1-14, Carrickmacross 2-8,
Scotstown 0-10, Ballybay 0-9,
Scotstown 1-17, Magheracloone 2-11.
Ballybay:
Ballybay 1-19, Magheracloone 2-9
Ballybay 0-9, Scotstown 0-10
Ballybay 0-16, Truagh 0-13
Ballybay 1-15, Clontibret 1-8
SCORING AVERAGES
Those results show that in their 3 matches to date Scotstown have scored a total of 2-41, or just over 16 points per game while conceding 4-28, or just over 1-10 or 13 points per game. Ballybay on the other hand have played 4 matches and have registered a total tally of 2-59 or just over 16 points per match, the exact same as Scotstown, while conceding 3-40 or an average of just over 12 points per game, which is marginally less than what Scotstown have conceded and is an indication of the very fine margins that have separated these sides so far and will probably do so again on Sunday.