Moran confident Cushendall ‘onslaught’ will be quelled
“We played Ballygunner in the last group game but before that we met in Cleaboy, at our old grounds, about two weeks before the All-Ireland final.
“Things were going on, there was a bit of disruption in the camp, so we had a good long players’ meeting and from there on we got going, more so than any team I was ever on — Fitzgibbon, county teams, any of them.
“I said a small bit. John said a bit, Derek McGrath, Owen Dunphy — we all said our bit because the older lads were getting a bit pissed off. Seven of the team that won the Féile in 1999 are playing Sunday, so we’ve a young team, and some of the younger players . . . were off enjoying themselves, as younger fellas are entitled to do, particularly when there isn’t a club game coming for a couple of months.
“We played Ballygunner in the last group game — six points down at half-time but we won by eight, so that was our best performance, in the second half, in a few years.”
De La Salle drove on after that. They beat Fourmilewater and Tallow in the quarter-final and semi-final respectively, but not all the stars lined out on Broadway.
“Derek McGrath was flying fit and going really well, but he pulled his hamstring on the Tuesday night before the county final.
“That was hard, he broke down because he’d be looking forward to the parade, things like that. He was crying down the end of the field as we finished training. But we talked that night, we knew we were going places.”
Moran and his teammates drew on their experiences of losing a decider three years ago. He’s still surprised by their opponents’ tactical choice before the final last year: “Abbeyside won the toss and opted to play against the wind for some reason. We couldn’t get over that because we knew the pitch was going to cut up. We got on top early on but in the second half, when they had the wind, it was a mudbath.
“I think it (experience) stood to us. Three years ago I was 18, the other younger lads were only a year older. But now, though we’re still young, we’ve learned a lot, and that experience stood to us, especially in the last 15 minutes — we got good scores when we badly needed them.
“That’s something the team is good at — we’re not great at pulling away from other teams, but we’ll never be hammered off the field. We can get scores when we really need them.”
The victory was an epic one, but the celebrations weren’t.
“It was probably the biggest win we’d ever had, and we had a good night on the Sunday and Monday, but we were all back on the Tuesday, everyone, and we were playing the following week against Sarsfields in Páirc Uí Chaoimh.”
Sars were favourites but De La Salle turned them over. Moran pays tribute to the influence of Brendan Fennelly from Ballyhale (“He expects to win, a totally different mentality, he told us we didn’t realise the opportunity we had,”) but the substitute teacher — in De La Salle College, where else — is rooted in reality anyway.
“If Cushendall beat us it’ll be because they deserve to beat us. If we’re beaten it won’t be because we expected to win and didn’t give them credit. We’ll give them more credit than any team we’ve played because this is the biggest game we’ve played.
“We’ve spoken about it — for us to win on Sunday we’ll have to improve. We’ve improved in every game we’ve played, we mightn’t have started well in the Munster final but we have to improve. They have nine of the Antrim team, so it’s ridiculous to think we’ll win easy.
“We expect to win because we’re confident. Cushendall are a serious team and the lads (management) have done their homework. We’re ready for an onslaught on Sunday.
“We see ourselves as underdogs to a certain extent — what divine right do we have to get to an All-Ireland final when we didn’t win a county final until 2008? They’ve played nine All-Ireland semi-finals, they drew with St Josephs Doora-Barefield a few years ago, so maybe they’ve been unlucky — hopefully we won’t be the team they beat to get to a final.
“If they beat us, they beat us, but it’ll be a great game.”
CONNECT WITH US TODAY
Be the first to know the latest news and updates
