Kilkenny senior footballers knocked out of All-Ireland Championship
Warwickshire 1-12 Kilkenny 1-9
Kilkenny’s All-Ireland Junior Football Championship campaign came to an abrupt end in Páirc na hEireann in Birmingham on Saturday evening against Warwickshire.
The Cats won the competition in its first year of its current form in 2022, beating New York in the final.
Since 2022, the competition has involved the winners and runners-up from the All-Britain Junior Football Championship, played between the county teams of Britain, alongside Kilkenny, New York and US GAA.
On Saturday night, Christy Walsh’s team led for much of the contest, holding a 0-6 to 0-2 advantage midway through the first half with Sean Manogue and Ger Malone converting two pointers.
Louis Monagtley netted just before half-time to narrow the away teams lead to two points at the break (0-7 to 1-3) and offer a warning sign as to what was to come.
Kilkenny utilised their bench in the second half, introducing Walter Walsh and Tommy Coogan at half-time in order to push off the growing Warwickshire pressure.
However, Warwickshire mounted a comeback and wiped out points from Tom Mullally and Sean Manogue to level proceedings by the 37th minute (0-9 to 1-6).
The captain in 2022 was Mick Malone and he lead by example throughout, bagging a crucial goal to turn the match back in their favour (1-9 to 1-6) just a minute later.
Kilkenny failed though to build on the goal and were kept scoreless for the remaining 20+ minutes to book a spot in the semi-finals at the GAA’s Centre of Excellence in two weeks time.