Toome’s sliding doors win over Loughmore

Killinan End

Plenty of recent county finals have provided novelty not least those involving Kiladangan who met Loughmore/Castleiney, Borris-Ileigh, and Thurles Sarsfields, for the first time in finals. Given the prominence of the two clubs over the past four decades at Dan Breen level it is difficult to imagine that Toomevara and Loughmore-Castleiney are meeting for the first time in the final.

Both clubs have provided so much to the county championship over the years that it is somehow appropriate they will finally stand in opposite corners at Semple Stadium as the opening bell rings on Dan Breen day.

Time was when the last word you would associate with Toomevara in the County Final was novelty in any sense - how quickly sixteen years has flown since they last graced Tom Semple’s field on the biggest day of all. In the grand scheme of things of course in club hurling this is not an enormous gap. Clubs come and go and shifting between grandeur and decline is part of the natural order.

Loughmore-Castleiney did play a part, however, in the match which opened up no end of possibilities for a young Toomevara side some 32 years ago. It had been a mixed championship for the Greyhounds. After an early defeat against Borris-Ileigh, they meandered their way to a North semi-final but found the Lorrha mountain a little too steep after an epic series of matches.

Those boys in blue would unsuccessfully contest the North Final against the Nenagh blues, while Toomevara licked their wounds and contemplated the County championship. Not for the last time during their great run Toome managed to find pockets of air when it seemed their championship prospects were suffocated. Not only had Lorrha to endure North final disappointment but they also bowed out of County consideration after a play-off with League winners Toomevara – their fourth meeting.

Both Nenagh and Toomevara enjoyed straightforward quarter-final wins against opposition from the South in Thurles. The other side of the draw, however, was not so simple. The Mid final between Sarsfields and Loughmore had been drawn and the clubs cited an apparent agreement that in the event of the draw in the divisional final a week’s leeway would be afforded before the quarter-finals. The County Board chairman was not having this, and, in the end, we had a remarkable spectacle of the two Mid teams being thrown out of the championship.

Like any good GAA disciplinary decision this lasted about as long as a bag of chips on a Féile weekend, though to be fair it took a very tight vote at County board level to reinstate the teams. A month after they were originally scheduled the Mid finalists played their quarter-finals against the West representatives and progressed to the semi-finals. This cleared the way for North v Mid semi-final pairings.

Nenagh exited the championship after a replay against Sarsfields. The first day in Thurles was touch and go before finishing level. The replay a week later in Cloughjordan saw the North champions well beaten. This is where we come to a seminal meeting between Loughmore and Toomevara. Would Loughmore get a chance to repeat their Mid Final win over Sars? They had come from ten points down with nine minutes left to win in extra-time so that would have made quite a County Final. Not only that but they had toppled the County and Munster Champions, Cashel, in the last eight. Fate would decree, however, that Sarsfields and Loughmore would wait another couple of decades to be partners at the big dance.

None of it was easy though, Toome-Loughmore back in ’92 was a battle of attrition. The Greyhounds were young but tough and game. One commentator in a local paper at the time speculated ahead of the Nenagh-Thurles replay that Toomevara would be “licking their chops” at the prospect of “wiring into” one of these teams. Even then their ability to force opponents to go to deeper places was evident.

If Loughmore had shown resilience and never-say-die spirit in the Mid Final, they met their match in that respect on this day. This was dour and error-strewn but a glorious semi-final if you were from the North of the county. Late in the game the Mid champions led 0-9 to 0-7 but it was Toome that came up with four late unanswered points to get across the line. Tommy & Terry Dunne – Minors both – had five points between them.

When they held the Dan Breen cup around the Toomevara bonfires four weeks’ later they could reflect on a long tough campaign. Arduous days in the North against Borris and Lorrha built them for such tough days on the County stage. The day against Loughmore marked them as a team on the threshold of great things. A couple of them, Philip Shanahan, and Tony Delaney, finished as legends with eleven county medals. As with Sunday they too were underdogs. Who knows where a win might take this generation?