Murphy hopes Rangers can mount another challenge next year

In the fullness of time, they will view it as a remarkable journey and a breakthrough season, but Mount Leinster Rangers’ desolation at full-time reflected their lofty ambitions.

There was simply no accepting that reaching an All-Ireland final and then being beaten represented a positive outcome for a side from Carlow.

Talisman forward and chief scorer Denis Murphy said: “We’ve won three in a row in Carlow and the Leinster title and got to the final but I have to say, we still didn’t win it, it’s not much good getting here if you don’t win it. But this gives us hope that we can get here next year, maybe the year after. There’s no reason why we can’t.

“At the end of the day, it’s one club against another club and it just proves that if one group of players believe, then this is how far they can come.

“We kind of proved it to all the small clubs in the country that if they believe hard enough, they can get to the big time and that we, or they, can get across the line the next time.

“It’s not an ageing team, it’s a young team and we have a good structure in the club as well so there are young players coming up the whole time.

“We can definitely push on. We’ve got our first Leinster title and our first All-Ireland final out of the way.

“Maybe we were a bit awestruck, it could have happened to some of the players maybe, but there’s no reason why we can’t move on and be like the Portumnas and Ballyhales. I know we’re from Carlow, but why not?”

Mount Leinster boss Tom Mullally reckoned his side were trumped in the experience department by Portumna, who have now collected four titles inside a decade. Mullally said: “They have been down this road before, it was a new experience in a huge amount of ways for us. I was quite happy at half-time. If you had said a week ago we’d be three or four points down at half-time in the All-Ireland final, we’d be more than happy that we could push on in the second half.

“But I have to pay a huge amount of respect to Portumna and compliment them fully on their second-half performance. I think they showed their true credentials as champions.”