Drawn affair see Ballaghaderreen secure home quarter-final
Ballaghaderreen's Shairoze Akram fends off Darragh Beirne of Claremorris. Picture: John Corless
A hard-fought draw with Claremorris on Sunday afternoon was enough to see Ballaghaderreen secure top spot in Group 3 and with it safe passage into the quarter-finals of the senior championship.
Claremorris had started the game in blistering fashion and raced into a five-point lead. Kevin Beirne’s charges had already clocked up three wides by the time Cathal Joyce opened their account with a single. This was quickly added to by a point from Conor McGuinness and a brace of frees from Darragh Beirne, before Niall Hurley raced out in front of his man, turned and curled over first time to add number five.
Ballaghaderreen were struggling to create anything meaningful up front but they conjured a goal almost from nothing as Ryan Lynch went long into Darragh Kelly, who showed great strength to hold off his man and blast home. The respite was short lived, however, as Claremorris responded with a pair of frees from McGuinness before raising a green flag of their own. Hurley played in David O’Reilly and he was unceremoniously knocked to the ground for a penalty. James Shaughnessy made no mistake from the spot, firing low into the bottom righthand corner of the net.
Finding themselves seven down, the border men needed scores and Kuba Callaghan obliged with their first point, after all of 26 minutes, from a free. The game was then blown wide open when Lynch found Kelly once more and the big full forward managed to flick it over the head of the outrushing goalkeeper and into the back of the net.
Callaghan then tacked on a free to cut the gap to two. But Claremorris would have the final say in the half, as a shot from distance was spilled by goalkeeper, Jamie Lunt, and Beirne was on hand to rifle in the rebound, to leave it 2-7 to 2-2 at the break.
The early exchanges of the new half were tit-for-tat, with Cathal Joyce and David Drake trading scores, before Callaghan, a free, and Hurley, with a peach from distance, did likewise. The game truly sprung to life when Kelly again claimed a long ball in, before laying off to Kane Phillips, to rattle the onion bag. Lynch then sent over a monster from distance to cut the gap to the minimum. Claremorris managed to halt their momentum however, as Hurley, with another beauty, and Beirne, a free, raised white flags.
Tomas Morley’s men were then dealt a further blow as Aaron Lynch was black carded for a third man tackle. Despite their numerical disadvantage, Ballaghaderreen would hit a purple patch, scoring 1-2 without reply. A brace of Callaghan frees, came either side of a goal for Cormac Doohan, who had been played in following an excellent run from David McBrien.
Suddenly finding themselves two points in arrears it was Claremorris who needed scores and the Beirne brothers duly obliged, with Darragh nailing a free and Conor sending over a point from distance.
Cian Hanley was then shown a straight red for a poor tackle on Rio Mortimer. But it was Ballagh’ who would edge ahead once more late on, as Callaghan sent over what looked like the winner, only for Conor Beirne to equalise with the very last kick, to secure a share of the spoils and bring the curtain down on Claremorris’s season.
