Sallins show ruthless touch to claim Junior championship
Sallins celebrate winning the Junior 'B' final Photos: Aisling Hyland
A blistering opening half performance from Sallins saw them sweep aside Castlemitchell with ease in the Ayu Junior A Kildare LGFA championship final.
After a laboured start, an Erin Brereton Foley free opened the scoring after five minutes of action as Castlemitchell took an early lead. This was to be short lived as Sallins soon responded with Ella Flanagan pointing within sixty seconds. After this it was from the next kick of the ball, Sallins took the lead. Gathering Kali Mulhall’s kick out Aoife Kenny blasted into the back of the net to send Sallins into the lead.
They looked to build on this immediately with Lia Reilly claiming Mulhall’s kick out from Hodson’s goal to chip over and leave Sallins four clear with seven minutes on the clock.
Castlemitchell were struggling to get the ball out of their own half and All-Star goalkeeper Mary Hulgraine was a virtual spectator between the Sallins’ posts. Aoife Kenny’s goal on the stroke of ten minutes left eight between the sides.
Four Hodson points, one from play and three frees in the run in to half time looked to take the Sallins advantage to twelve before a late point from Zoe Harris against the run of play narrowed this advantage slightly as the half drew to a close.
As soon as the ball was thrown in for the start of the second half, Sallins continued where they had left off. They pushed forward hoping to seal their place as champions early on. And with Sophie Lawlor netting they got the result they had hoped for before Claire a Nugent added a point to leave them fifteen clear.
With time wearing on the tempo that Sallins had brought to the tie had begun to take its toll on them and with that the pace of the tie began to slacken mid way through the second half.
A Brereton Foley free followed by a point from a Chloe Walsh on her return from the sin bin sought to keep the Castlemitchell challenge alive. Yet unable to add to this they were unable to stage a comeback as time quickly ticked towards full time.
With the tie into the final four minutes of action Sallins looked to show the waiting crowds they were not just done as a long ball over the shoulder of Kenny sat up for her to gather on the turn to put a fourth past Mulhall in the Castlemitchell goals to complete a brilliant hat-trick of goals and round off a long day for the south Kildare side who were resigned to their fate early on and even a late Brereton Foley free could not lift them.
