Senior Championship reaches the business end of things

The Joe Mallon Motors Senior Football Championship is down to the last eight and it’s a busy weekend with the new Senior A competition throwing in as well. RICHARD COMMINS looks ahead to the action.

The odds suggest we will have the same four semi-finalists for the third year in a row and with six of last year’s final eight through to the quarter-finals again, one thing the new format for this year’s championship hasn’t done is provide variety when the competition reaches the closing stages.

Looking at the current odds, Naas are 4/6 favourites to regain the title, Sarsfields are 5/2, holders Athy 9/2 and Celbridge 6/1. Outside of that quartet, Maynooth are ranked next on 25/1.

The group stages played out pretty much along expected lines with Naas, Sarsfields and Celbridge winning three from three, although the latter only squeaked through by a point against both Johnstownbridge and Clane.

Athy, having struggled to stay in Division 1 of the league, have spluttered through their title defence as well. A strong second half saw them see off Kilcock by ten points but they had to dig deep to come from behind before edging out Sallins by a point and then let Raheens reel in a four-point deficit in injury time to claim the draw that qualified them for the last eight.

With that worrying form, not to mention Kevin Feely sitting out the last game, some will feel the champions are looking the most vulnerable of the ‘Big Four’ coming into a tricky looking tie against Maynooth on Saturday evening.

When Maynooth reached the semi-final in 2021 it looked like their underage efforts were starting to bear fruit but they were well beaten by Naas that day and this weekend marks their first quarter final in the intervening five years.

Their performance against Sarsfields in the last group game (the final six-point margin did not do them justice) suggests Maynooth are an improving outfit with former Kildare underage forward Paddy Mahoney in the form of his life. The diminutive Mahoney is second only to Eoin Cully in the scoring charts with 2-19 to his name.

That’s a healthy total compared to Athy’s joint top scorers, Niall Kelly (0-11) and Cian Keaveny (1-8) but Maynooth are no one-man team.

Athy haven’t defended the senior title successfully in five attempts since doing since the double of 1933/34 but you’d expect them to raise their game from recent levels and get the job done at the weekend.

In the earlier game at St Conleth’s Park on Sunday, Raheens’ prize for that last-gasp qualification is a clash with Celbridge and it’s hard to get a proper read on both teams.

Raheens did well to edge out Sallins in their group opener thanks to an injury time two-pointer from Paddy Woodgate but they let a great position slip against Kilcock the next day and it looked odds-against them heading into round three against Athy.

Athy seemed to have them at arm’s length for the duration but Liam Power’s goal and Woodgate’s free from a ‘breach’ rescued the ten times champions. Raheens have plenty of talent to push Celbridge, with the likes of Fionn Tully, Dara Crowley, Power, Woodgate and Jack Taaffe in their line-up.

What to make of Celbridge? They were highly impressive in a romp against Allenwood, but then allowed a decent advantage almost slip against Johnstownbridge and were a couple of missed ‘Bridge frees away from losing that one.

Against Clane, the Blues conceded a late, late two-pointer to Shane O’Sullivan for a breach but Aaron Browne’s clinical finish earned them the points. On the one hand, Celbridge would probably have expected to have bigger wins against both those opponents but they perhaps will feel they’ll get greater benefit out of winning a couple of tight encounters, given their recent history.

Anything other than a Celbridge win would be a major shock in that one, and the same applies when Naas take on Johnstownbridge in Sunday’s opener in Newbridge.

Naas seem determined to prove last year’s final defeat to Athy, which denied them a five-in-a-row, was merely a blip, and with the exception of a late Moorefield rally in the opening game, they have coasted through to this stage. A scoring difference of +31 says it all.

The County Town side have the greatest panel depth of anyone as illustrated by the likes of James Burke, Neil Aherne, Liam Kenny, Seán Hanafin and Fintan Quinn coming off the bench the last day. Ryan Sinkey hitting the groove with four points from play against Clogherinkoe was ominous as well.

Johnstownbridge, for their part, have had a fine campaign to date. They are perennial quarter-finalists, this being their ninth in ten years, but their last win at this stage was against Clane in 2017.

Their spirit seems strong this year and they have most of their big players available, with Luke Flynn’s return a real bonus while former county under-20 full-back Tomas Von Engelbrechten has been in fine form and in attack Darragh Sloane’s proficiency at two-pointers has few equals.

There’s enough talent in that Johnstownbridge team to push Naas all the way, but you’d have to fancy Jimmy Higgins’ new charges to progress once more.

Which brings us nicely to the Newbridge derby where Sarsfields will be favourites to extend their recent superiority over their old rivals Moorefield. The Sash have not lost to Moores since 2017 with four wins and a draw (in the 2019 final) to their credit since then.

Sarsfields are motoring nicely, with comfortable wins over Carbury and Caragh followed by that narrower success over Maynooth. With Con Kavanagh and Matty Byrne back they seem stronger around the middle while younger lads like Cathal White and goalkeeper Cathal Moore have added new pep to the team and Conor O’Donovan and Ryan Kearney continue to impress up front.

Kearney, who plays soccer for Newbridge United has an unfortunate clash with the Lumsden Cup final on Sunday and it will be interesting to see how he solves that dilemma. With Ben Loakman on the sidelines Sarsfields will be hoping Kearney is available along with Ben McCormack who managed just under 40 minutes against Maynooth.

Moorefield continue to extract incredible performances out of their ‘experienced’ resources, Kevin Murnaghan’s display the last day against Eadestown a case in point. The likes of Tommy McGrath and Evan O’Brien continues to impress from the younger brigade, though, and with Aaron Masterson having a fine campaign at midfield, they will expect to be within a couple of points coming down the home stretch. But again, the favourites Sarsfields would appear to have too much in their arsenal.

Somewhat off-Broadway, the Senior ‘A’ championship opens with the clash of Carbury and Clane in Round Towers on Saturday with the other three games on Sunday seeing Caragh play Clogherinkoe in Manguard Park while Allenwood play Sallins and Eadestown play Kilcock in a double-header in Clane.

It’s hard to know how teams will approach this ‘A’ competition but with wins needed at the weekend to avoid the relegation scrap, we tentatively favour Clane, Clogherinkoe, Sallins and Eadestown to prevail.