Inside Track: Scrap for quarter-final places ends with a clinker
Inside Track with Joe Carroll
The scramble for places in the Louth senior championship quarter-finals ended at Darver on Monday of last week. There couldn’t have been a more fitting finale.
Cooley Kickhams were out against Dreadnots, both in with a chance of joining group 3 winners, Newtown Blues, in the last eight. It wasn’t just a win Dreadnots needed – they had to finish at least four points or more clear.
The Clogherhead team got the verdict, but weren’t far enough in front. Two points divided the sides, Cooley fighting back from what appeared a hopeless half-time situation.
Dreadnots now face a play-off – maybe two of them – to avoid being relegated to next season’s intermediate championship.
Tough luck on a team that contributed so much to the game with Kickhams, easily the best in the competition.
It’s as old as the game itself, the saying ‘end to end stuff’. That’s what the crowd was treated to, the aim of both sides to get the ball into their opponent’s half as quickly as possible. Crossfield and back passes were kept to the minimum.
There was certainly no hanging around, nor was there a shortage of good scores, nor, indeed, the absence of mistakes. Plenty of missed chances as well, Dreadnots claiming most of them. The game, ending with a 2-15 to 2-13 scoreline, had just about everything you’d want to see.
Cooley’s reward is meeting with St Joseph’s, one of just two teams to come through the league section unbeaten. Hopes of the Joe Ward Cup coming back to the peninsula for the first time in 36 years are alive.
The pairings for the other three quarter-finals are: St Mary’s and St Fechin’s, Newtown Blues and St Patrick’s, and Dundalk Gaels and Mochta’s. All matches go ahead this weekend.
Mochta’s recovered from a heavy beating by Mary’s to get it surprisingly easy against Hunterstown Rovers. Rovers were firm favourites, having shocked Mary’s in the first round, but had no answer when Moch’s turned on the taps in the last quarter.
Earlier over the weekend, St Pat’s, on a recovery mission following their defeat by Gaels, beat Roche Emmets, while Naomh Mairtín took their leave of the competition by only taking a draw from their game with St Fechin’s.
Mairtíns, last year’s winners, were unable to call on the injured trio of Sam Mulroy, Tom Gray and Eoghan O’Callaghan, and now have Dreadnots to face in one of the relegation play-offs. Roche and Hunterstown meet in the other.
Mary’s remain favourites to win the title with the bookies, with Newtown Blues the second choice.
Mochta’s fancy prices to win out following their defeat to Mary’s, have come tumbling down in the betting, while St Fechin’s are the biggest price of the eight.