Borris use youth to their advantage

By Thomas Conway

This year’s county intermediate championship has produced an endless saga of absorbing, high-tempo drama.

Some of the games have felt less like camogie matches and more akin to Dan Brown thriller novels - full of plot twists and constant suspense. Saturday’s intermediate final was billed as another potential thriller, and sure enough, it didn’t disappoint.

The game itself was frenzied and frenetic. The weather was just as chaotic. There was pouring rain and hurricane-like wind, followed by strange periods of calm in which several rainbows emerged from behind the clouds. The players seemed not to notice. They just kept on playing, and the more they played, the more exciting it became.

On balance, Borris-Ileigh deserved to win. They were, ever so slightly, the better side. Early on it looked like a capitulation might be on the cards, but Borris came bursting back into the game from around the twentieth minute onwards, outrunning a Shannon Rovers side which ultimately grew tired and looked psychologically worn out at the final whistle.

The Borris captain, Aedin Hogan, was outstanding. She conducted most of their attacking moves and contributed 1-5 in total. Denis Kelly, who was recently ratified as the new manager of the Tipperary senior camogie team, will surely have taken note of her performance.

Hogan was glowing after the game. She looked like a woman who had just conquered the world, but she was eager to emphasise that she hadn’t done it alone. This was about the panel, about the players - past, present, and future.

“I’m over the moon,” she began.

“I’ve never won anything with the club before today, so this is just unreal, unreal.

“Being captain of those 28 girls on that panel is just such an honour. And a special shout out to Nicole Walsh as well. She has put so much into this team, this panel of players, and into Borris-Ileigh camogie. I had to take over her job as free-taker, which didn’t always go as planned, but I hope I’ve learned a trick or two from her!”

Whether Borris-Ileigh have the squad depth to cut it at senior level remains to be seen, but one thing is for certain, they have youth on their side.

Their gameplan revolves around relentless pressing and quick-fire counter-attacks, and requires massive pace and endurance.

Hogan drew attention to this after the game. She felt that, for the most part, the strategy worked last Saturday. Borris blew open the Rovers defence in the second-half, landing crucial scores, particularly in the final quarter.

“We have a lot of youth on our side, so we’re the kind of team that likes to use our legs - we like to run,” she explained.

“And that was our plan, to run at them and try and break open space going forward, and I think we did that for most of the game, particularly in the second-half. We started slowly, but once we got going, once we started running, things started to work for us.”

In order to survive at senior level, Borris-Ileigh must be able to sustain that high-tempo game for the entire sixty minutes. They are similar in style to Drom & Inch, and although they do not currently possess the same reserve of individual talent, they do have a number of promising young players within their ranks. In other words, they are capable of causing upsets.

They are also capable of going a step further this year, and perhaps landing a provincial title. Hogan says she had never won anything with her club prior to last Saturday. By the end of his season, she could have a nice collection of new silverware adorning the mantlepiece.