Managers reflect on the highs and lows as ‘Robe blow promotion chance

John Reilly had just masterminded a monumental and proud day for his club when he paused to reflect on Kilmeena’s first ever county intermediate title win.

“After the Moy Davitts game in the semi-final it was both exciting and amazing, however, today there was just a sense of relief at the full-time whistle,” the Kilmeena boss admitted.

“Ballinrobe really put it up to us and they managed to put us under a lot of pressure. But fair play to our lads, they really had to dig deep. It was great to see some of the young guns of our team, the likes of Darragh Slattery and Liam Moore combining to get that last score at the end. The pride that we feel today in the club is massive and it will take a few hours for everything to sink in and realise just what we have actually achieved.” John Reilly said his troops didn’t panic at the concession of an early first-half goal.

“We knew that they are a threat from the long ball and it was a well-taken goal by Kevin Quinn. The same thing happened against Moy Davitts a couple of weeks ago and we thought ‘here we go again’. However, we regrouped and we were a point up at half-time. The second-half goal from Caolach Halligan put us two points up and perhaps then we started playing the ball around the pitch a bit too much.

“Ballinrobe’s levelling point from Evan O’Brien was just class, but again our team just came back with the right attitude and we managed to grind out the victory,” beamed the manager who now must start plotting and planning for a clash with Leitrim champions Annaduff in the Connacht championship. The famous West Mayo club will have their homework done on the Shannonsiders, he insists.

“We will have a look at Annaduff and prepare for that game. I am not sure yet what venue that game will be at. The boys will enjoy tonight and there will probably be a Monday club! However, these are the days you train and play for, and they don’t come around too often. Overall, we are just delighted,” he concluded.

The scene was a lot more sombre over in the opposite corridor where Ballinrobe manager said his troops had expected to win.

“It looked alright for a while in the first-half and it even looked well for us for a while in the second-half, especially the way we responded to Kilmeena’s goal. We managed to get five points and I thought that the momentum was with us. However, they finished the game stronger and overall they were better than us on the day.

“We tried awfully hard but we didn’t play as well as we can and at the end of the day that was the two points difference in the end.” Ford went on to expand on where his side had not played to its full potential.

“I know we made the good start but we didn’t play well during the first-half and did a lot of silly things. There was a lot of aimless balls sent into our forward line and we weren’t as precise with our passing as we normally are. We struggled at times to get out of defence with the ball and Kilmeena tackled very well.

“Saying that, the way we played wasn’t bad and we were only a point down at the break. We stayed in the game up to the end, but we didn’t play to our potential. Up to the very last score there was always a chance that we could have gotten something out of the game, but at the end of the day we didn’t do it.”