Harnedy: Imokilly wanted to win another title for departing manager Condon

IMOKILLY captain Seamus Harnedy said to lead the side to their third title in-a-row was unbelievable and something he thought would never come true.

He was also full of praise for the Glen after their close-fought battle yesterday. But he wasn’t able to celebrate too much last night, as he is graduating from UCC today as a teacher. 

“I’m very proud to be captain of this side for the last few years, it’s very hard to put into words just what it means,” said Harnedy. “For years you would be dreaming one senior inter-county but to win three in-a-row is unbelievable.

“But there was one man in particular that we wanted to do if for today and that was Fergal Condon and when he told us on Thursday night that it would be his last game in charge of us that really motivated us.

“We wanted to prove here today that we are a very unified team and a great bunch of friends. We heard a lot about divisional sides but we wanted to make up for years of hurt before this, losing out by close margins at times to the likes of Erin’s Own and Sars but ever since then we started going after a team performance game after game and year after year and getting there.

“That’s down to the like of Rasper, Derek Barrett and the rest of the management team, including the old fella who keeps me grounded. It’s really hard to put into words what this means.

“It hasn’t really sunk in yet to what we have achieved this year and hopefully we can keep going. We knew that this was going to be a hotly contested battle and we weren’t going to get anything easy from such a great side.

“You can see they are tried and tested and battle-hardened, got over Charleville by a point and Newtown by a point, so they are really battle-hardened and we got what we expected from them.

“They have some seriously talented players in the likes of Robert Downey, a serious up and coming hurler and in Hoggie I wouldn’t be surprised if he gets Hurler of the Year.”

On his goal just before half-time, which was a crucial score he said: “I have built up a good relationship with Paudie O’Sullivan over the years and he could easily have gone on himself to score, but in fairness he put me in and I managed to finish it.”