Enda McGinley: 'I'm probably still in shock just at what happened in the first half'
CHAMPIONS: Cuala captains James Power, left, and Luke Keating lift the Andy Merrigan cup. Picture: Daire Brennan/Sportsfile
A final that could be told in two almost completely contrasting halves and the towering performances of two opposing players.
For a footballer known as a great all-rounder, it was fitting that Con O’Callaghan completed his medal tally with an All-Ireland club. He may have finished top scorer but it was his industry in abetting team-mates to inflict damage on Errigal Ciarán that at times in the first half felt relentless that was his calling card here.
In that opening period, the game at times felt like it was being played to his tune. If he wasn’t teeing up colleagues, he was diverting attention away from them. In the dying stages when an insurance point was required, it was he who drove forward and gave substitute Conor Groarke the platform.
Peter Harte would be considered more of a jack of all trades than O’Callaghan but he was his side’s top scorer from play after an extraordinary individual second half of defiance.
His rasper of a goal helped eat into a 13-point half-time deficit that would have looked and felt insurmountable for most especially with Darragh Canavan retiring from the game with suspected concussion.
Like O’Callaghan in the first half, most of what his team did right in the second involved him and to be within a score of Cuala in additional time was his refusal to allow Errigal Ciarán go gently into that good night.
But the margin, which had been 14 points at one stage in the second half, was in the end too much to bridge. Cuala may have only scored five second-half points but to withstand the level of assault aimed at them was pretty much all they were concerned about.
“It got a little bit closer than I'd have liked their times,” said Cuala manager Austin O’Malley. “But look, full credit to our guys, I thought, just they still managed to pinch those vital scores and manage the ball a little bit better and so on. And that's, I suppose, just allowed us that little bit of cushion to see it out to the end there.”
They were a considerable 3-9 to 0-5 ahead at the interval and appeared to be coasting to victory in front of a 31,267 crowd in Croke Park. Early doors, Errigal Ciarán appeared as shellshocked as Na Fianna did in the hurling decider. The signs were ominous as Darragh Canavan messed up a simple solo early in the game but the warning light appeared five minutes in when Cal Doran slipped a goal past Darragh McAnenly having been put in for the chance by Mick Fitzsimons. Harte had been dispossessed for the score.
The Ulster champions were being turned over cheaply in Cuala’s half of the field but their problems extended to their kickouts too where Peadar Ó Cofaigh Byrne and Peter Duffy were beating all around them. Con O’Callaghan’s ninth-minute point came seconds after Luke Keating had sent over his first free.
O’Callaghan’s point was the second score in an unanswered 2-4 by Cuala across 16 minutes. The second goal arrived in 13th minute from another kickout turnover, David O’Dowd the scorer and a primary architect of the score as he linked up with Eoin Kennedy and Ó Cofaigh-Byrne.
Frees followed from Keating and Con O’Callaghan prior to the latter pushing the ball through for Ó Cofaigh-Byrne to net a third goal in the 25th minute. Joe Oguz and Ruairí Canavan flew over points to ease some of Errigal Ciarán’s pain but the damage was substantial.
Star man Darragh Canavan also made way having shipped a heavy knock in the 22nd minute. If Enda McGinley had ducks, they would have drowned. “I'm probably still in shock just at what happened in the first half,” admitted the Errigal Ciarán manager.
“It'll take a wee bit of time to digest but we were miles off it in the first half and came in with obviously the game gone, it was gone even three quarters of the way through the first half. So an exceptionally difficult place to be, the boys are just devastated.
“Obviously, it was such a huge day for them and for the club to come and perform like we did in the first half. It's the nightmare you fear and it came to pass. But look, the world will keep turning and Monday will still come and we'll gather ourselves and move on.”
The margin was 13 at the break as the O’Callaghan brothers added further points in a half of dreams for Cuala. But after heaven came hardship. An Errigal Ciarán rally in the third quarter including that glorious Harte strike brought Enda McGinley’s side as close as six points.
The deficit was down to five by the 53rd minute and four a minute later when substitute Pádraig McGirr landed a point from distance. Inspirational in the second half, Harte’s second point brought Errigal Ciarán within a score in the 58th.
Cuala replacement Groake fisted over the insurance point in additional time, a gift from O’Callaghan on a day when he was the ultimate team-mate.
As the reality finally dawned on him that he couldn’t rescue Errigal Ciarán, Harte raged and was sent off. It took nothing away from his Herculean display on a day when Cuala denied what would have been the comeback of all comebacks.
C. O’Callaghan (0-5, 1 free, 1 45); P. Ó Cofaigh-Byrne, D. O’Dowd (1-1 each); L. Keating (0-3, 1 free); C. Doran (1-0); N. O’Callaghan (0-2); P. Duffy, C. Groarke (0-1 each).
: T. Canavan (0-6, 4 frees); P. Harte (1-2); R. Canavan (0-3, 2 frees); J. Oguz, O. Robinson, C. McGinley, M. Kavanagh, P. McGirr (0-1 each).
: R. Scollard, D. Conroy, M. Fitzsimons, E. Kennedy; E. O’Callaghan, D. O’Dowd, C. McMorrow; P. Ó Cofaigh-Byrne, P. Duffy; C. Dunne, N. O’Callaghan, C. Doran; C. O’Callaghan, C. O’Brien, L. Keating.
: C. Groake for C. O’Brien (42); M. Conroy for C. Dunne (49);
D. McAnenly; C. Quinn, A. McCrory, C. Quinn; P. McCartan, T. Colhoun, N. Kelly; B. McDonnell, J. Oguz; C. McGinley, T. Canavan, P. Harte; O. Robinson, D. Canavan (c), R. Canavan.
M. Kavanagh for D. Canavan (inj 22); E. Kelly for C. McGinley (48); P. McGirr for O. Robinson (52); C. Ó Giolláin for D. Conroy (54); R. McRory for T. Canavan (60+3).
: P. Harte (60+3).
: P. Neilan (Roscommon).
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