Galway men puncture Tooreen’s drive for five

It was on the back of superb second-half performances against Four Roads and St Gabriel’s that Tooreen reached a sixth straight Connacht intermediate hurling final and on the back of a massively below par second-half display upon which their hope of winning a fifth straight provincial title perished on Saturday afternoon.

Tynagh Abbey/Duniry of Galway were deserving winners at Hyde Park but with the margin between the teams standing at only two points, Tooreen will be full of regret. They led by four points at half-time but were outscored 0-10 to 0-4 in a second-half that saw them struggle to absorb the losses of Fergal Boland, Sean Kenny and Ciaran Finn to a variety of ailments.

Boland had been a totemic figure in the first-half but was replaced at the break having shipped a heavy blow to the head. And while the dual star returned to the fold for the final seven minutes of the game, Tooreen were unable to wrestle back the momentum from Tynagh Abbey/Duniry, managed by former Dublin manager Mattie Kenny.

Because of a clash in club colours the teams wore their respective county jerseys. Kenny’s men had led by three points after 10 minutes but a quarter hour of golden hurling saw Tooreen storm into a 1-9 to 0-7 lead, with Eoin Delaney lashing home a goal and two points in the first-half alone. Kenny Feeney whipped over four long range points from play as well and with Tynagh Abbey/Duniry quite reliant on the placed ball accuracy of Shane Moloney for points, the Blue Devils could be quite happy to lead 1-10 to 0-9 at the interval. And they were still three points to the good at the three-quarter stage, but were outscored 0-6 to 0-1 from there to half-time.

In Boland and Kenny’s absence, Tynagh Abbey/Duniry took control of the middle third through the efforts of joint captain Johnny Conroy and Ben Moran, who scored three points between them for the day.

Shane Maloney drew the teams level in the 48th minute and pucked his side in front three minutes later, both points coming from frees, whereas Feeney went short from one scorable free and saw another effort drop agonisingly short from play, while Liam Lavin and Brian Morley also saw efforts sail the wrong side of the posts down the stretch, as Tynagh Abbey/Duniry managed to hold out and become the first team other than Tooreen to win the title since Oranmore Maree in 2018.

See Tuesday’s Western People print edition for full coverage.