Long distance to travel yet for Castlelyons and Blarney after cracking clash

Head coach Paul O’Leary was delighted with the heart Blarney demonstrated for an excellently executed last-ditch close-in free from county star Mark Coleman to find the net and yield a 1-21 to 1-20 victory over Castlelyons in the Co-Op Superstores Cork senior AHC in Riverstown on Saturday.

“Our lads kept going to the end, and that’s what we asked them,” he said. “We knew after last year’s semi-final we wouldn’t get it easy. We’ve been building for this game for a while so delighted, and no better man than Mark Coleman to stick the goal, and what a goal.

“He has that confidence, and the ability more importantly. We’re delighted for him. Himself and Shane and Paudie have lifted everything since they came back in. They are a big part of our club.” 

Had they failed to seize that winning opportunity, Blarney would have had regrets over their shooting accuracy.

“In front of goal you have to take your chances. So we’ll reflect on that, that we have to get more clinical because there is no point creating them if you don’t take the chances. A bit of rustiness, maybe a bit of pressure as well.

“I was thinking, are we going to regret it? But it comes back to basics then and trying to turn over the ball and we did that and we put pressure on their puck-outs. We knew that was a good weapon of theirs. 

Put maximum pressure and try to eke it out. You have to keep calm as well.

“We thought we’d missed the chance but you just have to have faith in the work that we’ve done. They could have put up the white flag and felt sorry for themselves but no, they turned it around into a positive.” 

Despite being caught by that late score, Castlelyons manager Ciarán McGann was buoyed by their strong performance.

“We got as much as we could out of the lads, they played well. But that’s the joys of it. First round, there are plenty more nights yet, round two and round three. It is a good group. Each group is tough.

“Look, congratulations to Blarney. I remember a few years ago we played them out in Mourne Abbey in the first round and afterwards they beat us in the county final. It’s swings and roundabouts.

Lessons learned

“We’ll learn our lessons today, there were three times the ball was brought forward for discipline, especially the last one. And you just can’t get away with that at the top level when percentages are so tight.

"We had a stop-start league campaign, we had fellas injured, we had fellas travelling, we finished it well.

“We had three brilliant challenge games coming into this, we knew we had a performance coming, so very proud of the way the lads performed.

“Hopefully we will be back again. It is Watergrasshill next in three week’s time, and that is the focus.” 

There is strong morale amongst the players, and he is confident they’ll get back on track.

There is a brilliant mood in the camp, lads are training so well over the last couple of weeks. 

"We had fellas recovering from injury, fellas coming back from long-term travelling from four or five months and they all integrated back into the group.

“I’ve no doubt come Tuesday night again, we’ll get back on the wagon. Some of the performances out there were incredible. We’ll park it nice and quick.

“Credit to Blarney, they dug it out with the last free and Mark Coleman stuck it. You can’t give a player like that a 21-yard free at this level.”