Kilkenny IHL- Mullinavat secure rare senior hurling title

Mullinavat capped off a memorable league campaign with a win on Sunday, beating Thomastown in the Shield to secure a rare major senior title for the club.

Mullinavat finished the league stages with three wins and a draw in Group B of the St Canice’s Credit Union Senior Hurling League, suffering their only defeat to last year’s county champions O’Loughlin Gaels en route to last weekend’s decider.

In a near perfect day, Mullinavat headed the scoreboard for almost the entirety of the game, barring a three minute period just on the call of half-time with their half-back line imperative to win over the 60 minutes, shutting the door on Thomastown on numerous occasions.

After a bright opening, Thomastown’s latest defeat, their third in a row will leave a disappointing taste in the mouth and despite a good first half showing, the transition from a one point lead to a ten point deficit in a 20 minute period will at least Noel Doherty with room for thought heading into the senior hurling championship quarter-finals.

The opening exchanges were evenly contested with Mullinavat holding a slender 0-5 to 0-3 advantage after 11 minutes with Ger Malone, Joe Gahan and Conor Walsh cancelling out points from Peter McDonald and Naoise Dempsey.

Supporters in UPMC Nowlan Park were greeted by a free-flowing game early on with the teams continually trading scores to leave the scoreline at 0-9 to 0-8 after 15 minutes of play.

Mullinavat narrowly kept their noses in front with a flurry of scores to extend their advantaged back to three (0-12 to 0-9) by the 19th minute as Willie O’Dwyer and Ger Malone split the posts while Tom Aylward opened his account with an impressive 65.

But a Thomastown storm was about to hit as a super goal from Zach Bay Hammond drilled to the bottom corner of Sean Fitzpatrick’s net, set up sharply by Luke Connellan drew the teams level and was swiftly followed by points from Naoise Dempsey and Luke Connellan to give the men in blue the lead for the very first time by the 22nd minute (1-10 to 0-12).

However, what many Thomastown supporters may have thought would have been the driver for their team had the opposite effect as Mullinavat responded to the set-back with a series of punches and 1-3 without reply including an Adam Mansfield goal which was struck low past Diarmuid Galwey was the perfect ending to a positive first half for Mullinavat who lead the way (1-14 to 1-10).

Thomastown found the opening two points of the second half but struggled to cope with Mullinavat’s firepower as the men from ‘Vegas’ slotted over eight of the next nine points to spearhead the match at 1-22 to 1-13 just past the midway mark of the second half.

Noel Doherty’s side did show courage late on and fought back. Four points from Robbie Donnelly including a hat-trick of frees along with further scores from Zach Bay Hammond and Podge Kirwan created a bit of interest in the closing stages but in truth Mullinavat looked home and dry and Colm O’Byrne’s team deservedly held on for their six point victory.

Padraig Dempsey, was at the heart of the action for Mullinavat throughout the final and was a key component to the Mullinavat defence with Ian Duggan and George O’Connor joining him at left and right-wing back respectively.

“We came today looking for a win, obviously a performance a little more important than a win but we’re delighted with how it went,” Dempsey said after the match, adding, “please god we’ll reproduce it in two weeks time.

The centre-back heaped praise on some of his team-mates, stating Mullinavat’s successful year so far is down to the team as a collective.

“We’re delighted, we brought in a few lads, Padraig Dempsey on the full-back line flew it, Conor Walsh played a brilliant game wing-forward who is really coming in to his own so look it’s all looking good for the next two weeks but we’ll forget about this fairly quick and all eyes turn to the quarter-finals,” he said.

“Everyone was kind of writing us off at the start of the year saying we were heading for relegation and we wanted to prove a few lads wrong. There was a lot of people talking and look if we don’t win the next game it means nothing but yeah it’s nice, we like how we’re going and are hoping to prove a few lads wrong,” Dempsey commented.

TEAMS & SCORERS

Mullinavat - Ger Malone, Oisin Knox (0-6 each); Joe Gahan (0-5); Adam Mansfield (1-1); Conor Walsh (0-3); Ian Duggan, Willie O’Dwyer, John Walsh, Bill Dempsey, Padraig Dempsey (0-1 each)

Thomastown - Zach Bay Hammond (1-4); Robbie Donnelly (0-5, 0-2 frees); Naoise Dempsey, Colm Treacy, Rory Connellan (0-2 each); Pauric Kirwan, Brian O’Hanrahan, Luke Connellan, Peter McDonald (0-1 each)

Mullinavat - Sean Fitzpatrick; Bill Dempsey, Tom Aylward, Padraic Gahan; Ian Duggan, Padraig Dempsey, George O’Connor; Adam Mansfield, Joe Gahan; Willie O’Dwyer, Peter McDonald, Conor Walsh; Oisin Knox, Ger Malone, Brian Phelan.

Subs - Simon Aylward for Peter McDonald, John Walsh for Brian Phelan, Donchadh Walsh for Ger Malone.

Thomastown - Diarmuid Galwey; Peter Connellan, Jay Burke, Brian O’Hanrahan; Brian Staunton, Eddie Donnelly, Zach Bay Hammond; Jonjo Farrell, Peter McDonald; Robbie Donnelly, Luke Connellan, David Prendergast; Rory Connellan, Thomas O’Hanrahan, Naoise Dempsey.

Subs - Oisin O’Reilly for Brian Staunton, Colm Treacy for Naoise Dempsey, Daithi Barron for Jonjo Farrell, Pauric Kirwan for Rory Connellan.

Referee - Eamon Larkin (James Stephens)