Dominic Foley laments Charleville errors while Midleton 'put it together' for Micheál Keohane

Premier Senior is ruthless. It leaves little hiding place, year on year. If you’re not at your best, you’ll be found out.

For Charleville, the sting was that they had been at their best. Two wins from two, knockout spot secured. But against Midleton, 45 minutes of promise dissolved in a flat final quarter, and the nine-point defeat shunted them into second place in Group 2.

“It’s hard,” manager Dominic Foley said afterwards. “Obviously we’ll have to have a look back in it. Obviously, we're disappointed.

“I don't think we performed the way we could today. A lot of the time that can be down to the opposition. I was very impressed with Midleton. I thought they were physical, they fought hard, they have good hurlers, so maybe we weren't allowed play.

“We've got young boys in our team two or three 19 year olds, and we try and take the pressure off them, but sometimes it might get to them,” Foley remarked. “But as I said, maybe it's down to the work rate of Midleton. I thought they were very impressive, but we still can be better.

ERRORS

“We had a lot of errors that led to scores for them. At this level, you can't afford to be making that amount of errors.” 

Their reward as fourth seed? Reigning Munster Senior Hurling champions, Sarsfields.

One of the few Foley admitted he would have liked to avoid.

“If you're being selfish and you want to try and progress in this tournament, you probably want to stay away from the bigger boys. Sars probably – I haven’t heard the result – you’ve Blackrock and Imokilly who are very strong.

“We'll see what comes. We have to be better than we were today, no matter who it is.” 

Midleton, meanwhile, left in better humour, a quarter-final with Glen Rovers banked and a sense that the pieces are finally aligning. Peaking at the right time – the cliché rolled out every championship season – but you’d struggle to say it doesn’t apply.

“It’s definitely our best performance this year. We’ve been struggling to put it together on the day of games,” manager Micheál Keohane explained. “We've seen in small patches. Some of the training sessions leading up to the Newcestown game, were very sharp and we just didn't convert it on the day.” 

Conor Lehane’s six points from play caught the eye, but it was the collective effort that defined them. Tommy O’Connell was immense, young Tadhg O’Leary Hayes composed beyond his years, full-back Eoin Moloney rock solid – even Lehane himself contributed at the other end.

TACKLE NUMBERS

“As soon as our forwards have big tackle numbers, generally the game goes pretty well for us,” Keohane said. “To see Conor coming back and getting that turnover 30 yards from our own goal, and he picks it up, but then he has the composure to keep the ball as we go out and work it up, it was really good, the work rate was excellent.

He [Tommy] was incredible today. He’s such an intelligent player, he reads the game so well. He gets himself into brilliant positions. It's one thing getting into positions, but actually having the physicality to win that break, win that ruck, and then having the composure to give a good pass. He's been excellent.

“Tadhg is a really good man marker, but he's a very good going forward as well,” he said. “He's very composed. He's a really good player, a lovely young fella, and he’s working hard, which is a big part of it.” 

The margin matched Midleton’s victory over Charleville last year, though the north Cork men made a far more honest battle of it this time.

“That Charleville team are really good. We were under no illusions. We watched all of their games, we saw them playing a couple of times in the league and they've been very impressive.

“They've lots of really good players, all of the young fellas that are after coming into the team over the last couple of years are making a massive impact. I don't think anybody would be looking forward to playing them in the quarter-final.”