Kildare minors dare to dream as Breffni showdown
The Kildare team lift the Leinster Minor Football Championship after beating Meath in the final. Photo: INPHO/Grace Halton.
History awaits for Tommy Konstantin’s Kildare minor footballers in Breffni Park, Cavan on Friday night (7.35pm) when they aim to become the first team from the county to reach an All-Ireland Final in the grade for 53 years.
That 1973 final was the only appearance in the decider by a Kildare team and lo-and-behold their opponents in Croke Park that day were Friday night’s opponents Tyrone. In those days, of course, the minor decider was the curtain raiser to the big one (Cork v Galway in this case) on All-Ireland final day and 73,308 were in attendance, at least by the time the senior game threw in.
Kildare, backboned by a strong Athy contingent of six, had reached the final via a first ever Leinster title and a one-point win over Mayo in the semi-final but it’s fair to say the final passed them by somewhat, with Tyrone running out 2-11 to 1-6 winners.
It’s fair to say Mitchel Cogley in the Irish Independent was unimpressed with the fare on offer that day, the renowned sportswriter describing the game as a “ragged, untidy, uninteresting and often unpleasant display.”
“There was,” a disgruntled Cogley continued, “hardly a worthwhile passage in the hour and one vital statistic might serve as a caption to the whole dreary picture: there were sixty-seven frees in the sixty minutes. What kind of football game can you have with that carry on?”
On the evidence to date Friday night’s affair in Cavan should be an altogether more entertaining one, certainly if the dramatic Leinster Final win over Meath and last week’s first ever dethroning of Kerry at this level are anything to go by.
Tyrone, for their part, have been racking up some good scores on the way to an Ulster title and a Quarter-Final win over Galway. They kicked off with a 1-16 to 0-10 win over Armagh before beating Monaghan by 3-16 to 0-18. They had their scoring boots on again in beating Cavan 1-18 to 3-10 in the Ulster semi-final and they outscored Derry by 2-16 to 1-12 in the decider. Galway fell by 3-17 to 0-19.
That’s impressive scoring from Tyrone, though they have been conceding relatively highly too.
They of course have a pedigree at this level that puts Kildare in the shadows, the Red Hands having won no fewer than 27 provincial titles (including the last two) and ten All-Ireland crowns. They are the reigning champions as well having beaten Kerry in a dramatic final a year ago on a 1-16 to 1-15 scoreline and go into this as favourites, unsurprisingly.
The bad news is there’s another Canavan in the Tyrone team. Sharpshooter Conan is a nephew of Peter the Great and cousin of Ruairí and Darragh and was instrumental in the Ulster campaign, particularly in the final win over Derry.
The Red Hands were put to the pin of their collar against Galway in the last round, however, and no doubt Konstantin will have picked up some idea of potential weaknesses from that one. Connacht finalists Galway looked in command at half-time when they led 0-16 to 1-8, but Tyrone turned it around with a storming second half display in which they outscored the Tribesmen by 2-9 to three points.
The two Matthew Daly’s, both from Eglish, got the important goals in that spell and their earlier goalscorer Brian Óg McGuckin is another forward who has been making a name for himself.
Konstantin, though, has been keen to emphasise the qualities within his own team and they certainly weren’t overawed going in against Kerry, once described as the “Man United” of the GAA by a certain former Kildare manager.
Kildare were the better team two weeks ago from start to finish and once again the spread of scores and impact across the team was impressive. If anything, it was their most impressive performance to date, having scraped through against Louth in the Leinster semi-final followed by that pulsating provincial decider win over Meath on penalties after extra-time.
That the hero of that Meath win, Logan Tennyson, didn’t get to start against Kerry, illustrates the competition for places in a team that is superbly led from midfield by Charlie Doran while the likes of Liam Mescal, Páidí Ryan, Eoghan Lyons, Greg Kelly and Jack Reilly have been consistently impressive performers and ones that Tyrone will know all about by the end of sixty minutes on Friday night.
Can they win? You certainly wouldn’t bet against this team, who play front-foot attacking football with a verve that you love to see. Hopefully modern-day Mitchel Cogleys will be a little more impressed than the great man all those years ago.
Kildare’s team and scorers on that All-Ireland Final day in 1973 read:
A Dunne (Athy); G Clancy (Athy), J Graham (Raheens, captain), S Ryan (Athy); J Jacob (St Mary’s), P Archbold (Round Towers), T Brown (Clane); M Fennelly (Athy), P Winders (Raheens) 0-1; P Mulhearn (Maynooth), J Geoghegan (Leixlip) 1-4 (all frees), J Delaney (Castledermot); E Delahunt (Athy) 0-1, N Fahy (Monasterevan), B Whelan (Athy).
P Lyons (Clane) for Winders (inj), J Dooley (Monasterevan) for Fennelly.
