Ballina scale new heights to claim Intermediate title

GAA: FBD Insurance County Intermediate Football Championship Final

Ballina 1-13

Mullinahone 1-4

Report: Thomas Conway at FBD Semple Stadium

MATCH DIGEST

Player of the Match: Steven O’Brien (Ballina)

SCORERS – Ballina: Steven O’Brien 0-6 (2 frees, 2 ‘45s), Cathal O’Donnell 1-0; Ben King 0-2 (1 free), Eoghan Power, Conor Maguire, Sam Loughran, Jack O’Mahoney, Michael Breen 0-1 each.

Mullinahone: Éanna Ryan 1-4 (0-3 frees, 0-1 ‘45).

Step two complete! When Ballina first began to make waves in last year’s junior championship, some speculated that it might be the beginning of a much broader process, that it might represent the dawn of a new era in which the Shannonside club finally flourished with the big ball at adult level. They were right.

On Sunday, Ballina landed their second consecutive county football title, outplaying Mullinahone to secure the intermediate crown for 2022. They are now a senior football club. And they look like one too.

Ballina’s brand of dynamic, free-flowing football is certainly attractive on the eye, but it can also be marvellously effective, as Mullinahone discovered. The South club, which had dismantled their opponents in the group stages back in August, struggled to find any rhythm, frequently surrendering possession just outside the danger-zone.

Ballina, in contrast, minimised risk off the ball and maximised their return on it. They kept the scoreboard constantly ticking over and finished the job with a last-second Cathal O’Donnell goal.

It was a complete team performance, but it was led and conducted by the man who has achieved more in the game of Gaelic football than anybody else in the history of Ballina GAA club - Steven O’Brien. With his towering presence and explosive ball-carrying, the 28-year-old Tipperary midfielder delivered a performance which oozed class, guiding his side to victory on a bitingly cold autumnal afternoon.

O’Brien wasn’t the only one to show craft and finesse. Within fifty seconds, Ben King had slotted Ballina’s first score - a gorgeous left-footed effort which curled elegantly over from 35 metres.

Eoghan Power would add a mark several minutes later, before O’Brien pinged the first of four beautiful placed-balls, floating the ball into the Killinan End from just shy of fifty metres. Éanna Ryan responded for Mullinahone with a free of his own, and while the south side always looked dangerous on the front foot, those early stages were effectively dominated by Ballina.

The tempo dropped slightly in the second quarter, but Ballina continued to tag on crucial scores. Crucial, and in one case sublime. Sam Loughran’s seventeenth minute point was a work of art. Struck with the outside of the right boot, it bent inside the post at just the right moment and seemed to restore Ballina’s energy levels. O’Brien and Jack O’Mahoney would extend the lead yet further, but then the dynamic changed.

Depending on how you look at it, Éanna Ryan’s 27th minute goal was either the product of a disastrous defensive mix-up, or an ingenious piece of quick-thinking from centre-forward Mikey O’Shea. Mullinahone were awarded a free inside the semi-circle, with the Ballina defence, goalkeeper included, scattered about in all the wrong places. O’Shea dinked the free to Ryan, who swiftly finished the act and propelled his side back into the game.

On a day always destined to be relatively low-scoring, Ballina’s 0-9 to 1-2 half-time lead should have felt fairly comfortable, and yet there was an unmistakable sense of jeopardy to it. Mullinahone were hunting dangerously, and as the second-half unfolded their goal threat became ever more visible.

In the 35th minute, a moment of madness in front of the Ballina goal saw three attempts fizz and ricochet around the goalmouth. Keeper Jerry O’Brien - a late replacement for Jack Brady - made one outstanding save. He would later pull off another, confirming his reputation as a player who can quite literally do any job, in any position, in any code.

The closing minutes fizzled out without incident. O’Brien continued to be imperious, leading the charge with his masterful placed-kicking. Ballina’s substitutes were also impactful, none more so than Cathal O’Donnell, who completed his club’s ascent to the top-tier of Gaelic football in Tipperary with a late goal - bursting through an open channel to get on the end of a sweeping counter-attack.

It was the perfect note on which to end, but with a potential Munster Final now beckoning, there is a sense this season’s instalment of the Ballina football story has yet to reach its conclusion. For now, however, there is a county title to be celebrated.

TEAMS – Ballina: Jerry O’Brien (8), Paddy O’Donovan (7), Josh Egan (7), Terry O’Halloran (7), Conor Power (8), James Hanley (7), David Grace (7), Tom Lee (7), Steven O’Brien (9), Conor Maguire (8), Eoghan Power (7), Ben King (8), Jack O’Mahoney (8), Michael Breen (8), David Grace (7).

Subs: Harry Byrne (7) for Loughran (43); Teddy Doyle (7) for O’Mahoney (45); David Kelly (7) for Maguire (50); Cathal O’Donnell (7) for Ben King (60+1); Dara King (NR) for Grace (60+3).

Mullinahone: Graham Horan (7), Michael Cody (6), Cillian White (7), Daire O’Brien (6), Colin Shelly (6), Seán Curran (7), Conor O’Brien (7), Enda Keane (6), Martin Kehoe (7), Danny Dunne (6), Mikey O’Shea (6), Riain O’Halloran (6), Kevin Walzer (7), Eoin O’Dwyer (6), Éanna Ryan (8).

Subs: Jack Shelly (7) for Keane (HT); Paul Curran (7) for Dunne (HT); Alan Curran (NR) for C Shelly (54); Conor Whelan (6) for A Curran (58 inj).

Referee: Seán Everard (Moyne-Templetuohy).