Borris-Ileigh's experienced heads show them the way

By Shane Brophy

 

In the build-up to Sunday's County Senior Hurling final, the prevailing view was that Kiladangan's talent would get them over the line. However, as the week went on, more and more people began mentioning tradition when it came to Borris-Ileigh and their chances of winning their seventh Dan Breen Cup.

Whether tradition had anything to do with Sunday's victory is arguable but certainly they had enough experienced heads to guide them and that's what proved to the decisive factor in their three point victory.

Both sides had tasted county final defeats in 2016 and 2017 respectively, but it certainly appeared as if Kiladangan were again a little spooked by the occasion and never got into their flow, apart from the opening twelve seconds when Billy Seymour found himself through on goal but was denied by an excellent James McCormack save, with the help of the crossbar and post before finally being cleared.

If that goal had gone in, Kiladangan could well have relaxed and played the type of hurling they wanted to play. However, the greasy conditions didn't help with that either and they didn't help their own cause by trying to play summer hurling, with short passes not coming off with Borris-Ileigh really piling on the pressure if a Kiladangan player dithered on the ball at all.

On the other end, Borris-Ileigh were more pragmatic and their direct approach yielded dividends and while Conor Kenny was well marshalled by Darren Moran, they got enough out of the rest of the forwards to keep the scoreboard ticking over.

Niall Kenny gave Kiladangan full back James Quigley enough to think about, as did Jerry Kelly with his three points from play.

 

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