Diarmuid Connolly on that shot at glory: 'All I wanted to do was put the ball dead'

It was a moment that might have tormented him for years and, on reflection, Diarmuid Connolly has admitted he perhaps got it wrong by going for glory against Mayo.

Connolly surprised many by demanding the ball from Ciarán Kilkenny deep into injury-time of September’s drawn All-Ireland final and shooting for a score from a tricky sideline kick despite already being one ahead.

Kilkenny appeared to want to hold onto the ball, recycle possession and run the clock down to a famous win.

Instead, Connolly took a pot shot at glory and winced as it sailed wide and Mayo immediately launched the counter attack that led to Cillian O’Connor’s equalising point.

History, of course, will recall that Connolly scored a precious penalty in the replay to belatedly seal victory for Dublin, and back to back titles, though he must have been kicking himself the night of the drawn game?

“I didn’t think about it afterwards,” he insisted. “I thought we should have won the game in open play, to be honest with you. But sure look, these things happen. We went on and got the job done the second day.”

Still, he was the focus of plenty of commentary in the 13 days between games with many suggesting he was wrong to go for the score.

“Who?” enquired Connolly.”Look, I don’t read the media too much. All I wanted to do was put the ball dead. That was my (thinking). There was what, a minute left in injury time? Just put the ball dead. We could set up for the kick-out then, which actually didn’t happen.

“We were too slow for the kick-out. They ended up getting it off short and they went up and scored a point. But I wouldn’t say it was regrettable. Maybe I should have kept possession of the ball in hindsight. But these things happen in the game.”

Connolly will attempt to frustrate Kilkenny again on Saturday when they come up against each other in the Dublin SFC final. They will be the star players for St Vincent’s and Castleknock respectively in what is a novel final between the heavyweights of the capital club scene, Vins, and a club that was only created in 1998 and contested the 2012 junior decider.

“The funny thing is I have actually never played against Castleknock,” said Connolly. “We haven’t played them in the league yet and they only came up from intermediate last year. It’s a different challenge in that sense because most of the teams you play in the last rounds of the championship you know from over the years, you know their players, their systems, but Castleknock are a different animal that way.”

Connolly expects Kilkenny, a nominee for Player of the Year, to be a key performer at Parnell Park on Saturday.

“He’s a super athlete, he can play anywhere really, you saw him at wing-back when Macker (James McCarthy) got injured and he went in there and offered an attacking option for us. To be fair, he mightn’t have got on the end of a lot of scores like he did in previous years or even at underage level when he would have been the focal point for scores but he took that role and responsibility on himself and grew into it game by game. He had 54 possessions in one game, that’s phenomenal in a GAA game.”