Ballincollig footballers save their best until last in relegation playoff with St Michael's
Ballincollig's Ben O'Connell scores a point past St Michael's Dylan Corkery during their Premier SFC relegation play-off match at Ovens. Picture: David Keane.
Ballincollig survived the dreaded drop from the Premier Senior Football Championship with a comfortable win at Ovens on Saturday.
In by far their best performance of the year, they kept their best until last as St Michael's never looked likely to topple the Village.
You sense the tension beforehand but Ballincolllig got the perfect start with a green flag two minutes in. A high ball towards the square wasn’t dealt with and Darragh O’Mahony found space to drill a low shot to the corner of the net.
Former Cork senior hurling panelist Robbie Cotter showed his skills with a large ball as he split the posts a minute later with an exquisite kick. Ballincollig looked dangerous going forward and consecutive points from Danny Miskella and David O’Leary gave them a four-point cushion.
Michael's began picking up the dirty ball and three unanswered points got them right back in the game. Miskella ended a 12-minute drought in the 23rd minute and Ballincollig followed up with three unanswered points to go in at the break up 1-8 to 0-5.
The Village knew they needed to keep the pressure on for the restart and consecutive Sean Kiely points settled them. They had moved up a few gears and they were rewarded with a classy second goal in the 41st minute. A superb Cian Dorgan run saw him place a perfect assist to David O’Leary to convert from close range.
The dominance of Ballincollig continued, and they registered goal number three with 12 minutes remaining when Peter O’Neill found Dara Dorgan.
Michael’s were deflated side, despite battling to the wire, and got a second-half point through Eoin De Burca.
The energetic Cork U20 Miskella nailed a 53rd-minute penalty as Ballincollig showed their quality when it mattered.
After gaining promotion to the top tier in 2022 St Michael’s will now have to compete in the Senior A championship next season but this is a campaign they will want to forget.
D O’Mahony, D Miskella (1-0 pen) 1-3 each, D Dorgan 1-1, D O’Leary 1-0 each, S Kiely, C Dorgan (0-1 f), B O'Connell 0-2 each, L Fahy 0-1.
L O’Herlihy 0-4 (1 2pt f, 0-2 f), R Cotter 0-2, R Kavanagh, J Ryan (f), D Meaney, F De Burca 0-1 each.
C Walsh; S Murphy, L Jennings, S O’Donoghue; L Fahy, P Rose, D Desmond; S Kiely, B O’Connell; D O’Leary, D O’Mahony, P O’Neill; D Dorgan, D Miskella, C Dorgan.
R Noonan for D Dorgan (50), C Kiely for D O’Leary (50), C Dalton for P O’Neill (52), C Ahern for D Miskella (55), C Power for L Jennings (59).
M O’Connell; R Ahern, D Corkery, S Keating; A Murphy, F Leahy, R Kavanagh; E Hickey, E De Burca; L Carroll, A Hennessy, J Ryan; R Cotter, R O’Shaughnessy, D Meaney.
T Deasy for A Hennessy (h-t), E Hegarty for J Ryan (36), E Sheehan for L Carroll (38), L O’Herlihy for R Kavanagh (inj 42), L O’Sullivan for R Cotter (51).
James Regan (Lough Rovers).
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