AIB All Ireland Club SFC 2009/2010 S-Final – Kilmurry-Ibrickane (Clare) 1-14 Portlaoise (Laois) 0-8

Kilmurry-Ibrickane (Clare) defeated Portlaoise (Laois) by 1-14 to 0-8 in the AIB GAA Football All Ireland Senior Club Championship 2009/2010 Semi-Final on Sunday in the Gaelic Grounds Limerick.

Kilmurry-Ibrickane through to Club final

Feb 21, 2010

From the GAA.ie web site

Kilmurry-Ibrickane are through to their first ever AIB GAA Football All-Ireland Senior Club Championship final after a 1-14 to 0-8 win over 13-man Portlaoise at the Gaelic Grounds on Sunday. The Laois champions’ task was made all the more difficult when Brian Mulligan was shown a straight red card after 39 seconds, before Brian McCormack joined him in the dressing rooms when he was shown a second yellow card after the break. Michael O’Dwyer and captain Enda Coughlan kicked the Clare men into an early lead before McCormack and Barry Fitzgerald hit back for Portlaoise. However, Kilmurry hit a purple patch towards the end of the half, hitting four points without reply, as Ian McInerney, Noel Downes (2) and Michael O’Dwyer helped them to a 0-7 to 0-2 lead.

McInerney struck just before half-time as the Banner men claimed a 0-9 to 0-4 lead at the break. They hit the first two points of the second half to streak further ahead, before former Celtic soccer star Paul Cahillane pulled one back for the Laois champions. However, the game changed midway through the second half, as Portlaoise had a goal disallowed before Kilmurry settled the outcome when Downes hit the back of the net after a clever pass from substitute Mark McCarthy to give his side a 1-11 to 0-5 lead. Fitzgerald and Cahir Healy did grab points back for Portlaoise at the death, but Kilmurry-Ibrickane cruised to victory in the end on a 1-14 to 0-8 scoreline.

Kilmurry secure Clare’s first

By SEÁN MORAN GAA correspondent for the Irish Times Newspaper

THE GAA’S Central Competitions Control Committee will be awaiting the report of referee Michael Duffy after unruly scenes in yesterday’s AIB All-Ireland club football semi-final in Limerick’s Gaelic Grounds. Hot favourites Portlaoise ended up losing to Clare champions Kilmurry-Ibrickane and in the process had two players sent off, triggering furious protests from the Leinster champions at both half-time and on the final whistle when Sligo official Duffy, a brother of last year’s All-Ireland referee Marty, had to be escorted off the field by gardaí­ after being accosted by a Portlaoise supporter. Within 15 seconds of the start Portlaoise wing back Brian Mulligan had launched a high tackle on Kilmurry’s Shane Hickey and the referee showed him a straight red card. At half-time Duffy was confronted by Portlaoise officials, including manager John Mulligan, father of the dismissed player.

Speaking afterwards Mulligan senior was again critical of the referee. “I thought it was a joke. If the man has a conscience, he won’t sleep for a long time. I don’t want to sound a bad loser but it was an absolute joke of a refereeing decision. The man seemed to be out to make a name for himself. “He (Mulligan junior) caught him a bit high, it was definitely a free but a yellow would have sufficed. There is no such thing as consistency. One of their players came in as a sub, hopped off one of our lads and the referee did nothing. I asked him about it at half-time and he wasn’t going to entertain me.” Mulligan’s Kilmurry-Ibrickane counterpart Michéal McDermott not surprisingly saw things differently, saying the referee had made the right call in showing a red card. “The referee made a call on the dangerous tackle early on and if that happens, you’ve to go off for it. I thought he did a good job today and it was sad to see the scenes on the field there with the referee.” The second sending-off took place nine minutes into the second half when Portlaoise cenrefielder Brian McCormack was dismissed for a second yellow card. The first had been issued in injury-time at the end of the first half for dissent and the second for a foul.

It was the fourth time since winning the Clare championship Kilmurry have found themselves up against 14 men and they exploited the advantage with great efficiency in a performance of sustained commitment, against which Portlaoise appeared to lose their composure, going down to a heavy 0-8 to 1-14 defeat. Kilmurry will be Clare’s first representatives in the St Patrick’s Day football final but their opponents won’t be known until next weekend at the earliest, as yesterday’s other scheduled semi-final, between Galway’s Corofin and St Gall’s of Belfast, was postponed because overnight snow in Dublin left Parnell Park unplayable. The CCCC will today confirm refixture details for all of the weekend’s postponed matches but it is expected the Corofin-St Gall’s encounter will go ahead at the same venue next Saturday at 2pm (the Dublin hurlers are at home to Tipperary in the NHL the following day).

A mighty blow struck for Banner

Kilmurry-Ibrickane 1-14 Portlaoise 0-8

By Fintan O’Toole for the Irish Examiner newspaper

Monday, February 22, 2010

GIVEN its impoverished recent history, yesterday in the Gaelic Grounds was a momentous afternoon for Clare football. Despite the favouritism tag being attached to Portlaoise, Kilmurry-Ibrickane conjured up a powerful performance in this All-Ireland Club SFC semi-final. In the process they ensured that there will be a Banner county representative in the St Patrick’s Day club football showpiece next month for the first time ever.

This was no fluke victory. Kilmurry-Ibrickane had the best performers on the pitch and their sideline operators had a key input as well. The post-match revelation that the template for victory was borrowed from their illustrious football neighbours to the south was highly intriguing. On Saturday night manager Michéal McDermott sat his squad down and whipped out a copy of last summer’s All-Ireland quarter-final between Kerry and Dublin from the video vault. The genesis of Kerry’s success that day was their blistering start as they capitalised on Dublin’s long spell in cold storage. McDermott surmised that the circumstances before yesterday’s game were a replica and instructed his players to produce a hurricane opening. They duly obliged to blow Portlaoise away in the first-half and ahead by 0-9 to 0-4 by half-time, they were firmly on course for a final placing.

Kilmurry-Ibrickane’s cause was certainly helped by a dramatic opening to the game as Portlaoise’s numbers were cut to 14 when wing-back Brian Mulligan was dismissed after a mere 40 seconds for a reckless challenge on Shane Hickey. That shocking start clearly unsettled Portlaoise and the subsequent outpourings of vitriol from members of their camp at half-time were not beneficial either. Then the second-half dismissal of captain Brian McCormack for a second yellow card was the final nail in Portlaoise’s coffin as they lost one of their better exponents on the day.

But those controversies should not deflect from Kilmurry-Ibrickane’s brilliant showing. Overall it was not a spiteful game with the defining feature being Kilmurry’s superiority rather than Portlaoise’s sending-off’s. Kilmurry-Ibrickane exploited the early good fortune of being handed a spare man as Enda Coughlan and Evan Talty alternated intelligently to fill that role in the half-back line. That helped them to construct a barrier to repel Portlaoise’s attacking advances, and further back Mark Killeen and Martin McMahon kept a tight rein on Paul Cahillane and Colm Byrne.

Cahillane entered the game with a gilded attacking reputation from Portlaoise’s Leinster campaign, but Kilmurry-Ibrickane identified him as a threat and went about blunting his impact from the word go. They forced Cahillane onto his weaker right foot on several occasions and the one goal opening he had in the 20th minute became fruitless when the Kilmurry-Ibrickane defence swarmed around him and turned over possession.

Kilmurry-Ibrickane’s attacking play was strikingly good from the start as well. Scoring has not been their forte in this campaign but they reversed that trend by cutting loose in front of goal here. Several of their forwards hit full speed from the outset with Ian McInerney’s freetaking and playmaking exemplary, Stephen Moloney’s hard work seeing him shine on the left flank, and Michael O’Dwyer and Noel Downes both emerging as attacking diamonds inside.

By the close of the first quarter Kilmurry-Ibrickane were 0-5 to 0-2 ahead and that was a reward for their swift passing movements which created chances. Their excellent work ethic was maintained for the rest of the half as Portlaoise defenders found it extremely difficult to clear their lines and points by Michael and Peter O’Dwyer, and Downes left them 0-8 to 0-3 up by the 26th minute. It was proving to be a miserable occasion for Portlaoise who relied on the promptings of Cahir Healy, McCormack and Craig Rogers to keep them afloat.

McCormack appeared the only attacking card they possessed and he kicked two tremendous points in the opening period. But the half ended in adversity for him as he picked up a costly yellow card in injury-time for protesting to referee Michael Duffy about the build-up play to a Kilmurry-Ibrickane free. It seemed valid to complain as Noel Downes touched the ball on the ground but the Clare side got the break and McInerney’s free gave them a five-point cushion at the break. Once it became apparent early in the second-half that Kilmurry-Ibrickane were going to maintain the high standards and tempo of their football, they never looked like being defeated.

It was 0-11 to 0-5 when McCormack saw the line in the 39th minute and then the match was killed off when Downes beautifully finished to the net five minutes later after a perceptive pass by substitute Mark McCarthy. Kilmurry-Ibrickane confirmed their superiority in the closing stages with their most celebrated name Odhran O’Dwyer jumping off the bench to claim a wonderful score at the death and seal a handsome eight-point win.

Scorers for Kilmurry-Ibrickane: N Downes 1-2, I McInerney 0-4 (0-3f, 0-1 ‘45), M O’Dwyer 0-3, J Daly 0-2 (0-2f), E Coughlan, P O’Dwyer, O O’Dwyer 0-1 each.

Portlaoise: P Cahillane 0-3 (0-2f), B Fitzgerald (0-2f), B McCormack 0-2 each, C Healy 0-1.

KILMURRY-IBRICKANE: D O’Brien; D Hickey, M Killeen, M McMahon; S Hickey, E Coughlan, E Talty; P O’Connor, P O’Dwyer; M Hogan, I McInerney, S Moloney; M O’Dwyer, O O’Dwyer, N Downes.

Subs: M McCarthy for Moloney (43), O O’Dwyer for Downes (46), B Moloney for Talty (58).

PORTLAOISE: M Nolan; E Bland, K Fitzpatrick, M McNulty; B Mulligan, C Healy, K Lillis; A Fennelly, B McCormack; C Boyle, B Fitzgerald, B Glynn; P Cahillane, C Byrne, C Rogers.

Subs: T Fitzgerald for Byrne (half-tine), B Smith for Glynn (42), J Fennell for Boyle (49), P McNulty for Cahillane (55).

Referee: Michael Duffy (Sligo)