Summerhill land league title

A FL DIV 1 FINAL

By the time the senior championship kicks off in a couple of weeks time, and Summerhill and Ballinabrackey renew acquaintences in the opening round, this dour A FL Div 1 final at Pairc Tailteann tonight will be long forgotten.

In a contest where defences were dominant it was the senior champions Summerhill who claimed the crown with a 2-13 to 0-7 win.

With both sides intent on defending in numbers and hitting on the counter, it was Summerhill who were much more effective and the fact that it took Ballinabrackey 32 minutes to open their account showed how difficult they found it to unlock the Summerhill rearguard.

Ballinabrackey set out their stall from the off. They wanted to be difficult to break down and a nuisance to play against, but Summerhill proved that patience and persistence is the most effective way to throw off the blanket defence.

There were flashes of brilliance. Barry Dardis's majestic free from the ground, Damien Carroll's sublime point with the outside of his right, Niall Smullen's exquisite score with 10 minutes remaining - but even those moments of genius failed to spark a dull encounter.

Summerhill were methodical, professional, in their approach in the opening half. They retained possession comfortably, knocked on the Ballinabrackey door time and again, before bursting their way through to pick off easy scores and earn handy frees.

Both sides were pulled up for some harsh frees and any dissenting slip of the tongue was quickly penalised by referee Joseph Curran who was determined to keep a tight rein on proceedings.

The scores flowed in one direction for the majority of the opening half.

Conor Frayne cut in from the wing and clipped over the opener in the fifth minute, but the substantial crowd had to wait almost eight minutes for the next score, a free from Eoghan Frayne after his brother Conor was fouled.

A sweeping move from midfield in the 17th minute, led by the high press of the Ryan twins, saw the pair combine inside the semi-circle where Ross picked out Ronan and he executed a finish a full-forward would have been proud of.

Eoghan Fryane added another couple of frees to make it 1-4 to 0-0 before Dardis strode out beyond the 45 metres line to arrow one between the posts from under the shadow of the stand into the O'Mahonys end.

Eoghan Frayne tagged on his fourth free and three minutes before the break Conor Frayne almost bagged a second goal, but he was brilliantly denied by a superb Conor Ennis block.

Two minutes into injury-time Ballinabrackey finally made a breakthrough with Danny Quinn converting a free after Adam McDonnell had unceremoniously halted Sean Coffey's drive goalwards - that made it 0-1 to 1-6 at half-time.

Within a minute of the restart the ball was in the Ballinabrackey net after Dardis's effort came back off the upright and hit the unfortunate Ennis and ended up in the net. However, the referee assessed that there were Summerhill men in the square and he ruled the goal out.

From the free out Summerhill won possession and stretched their lead with Dardis on target and with with the cushion of a nine-point lead they eased off the gas sufficiently to give Ballinabrackey some oxygen.

Smullen with a score from 42 metres and Carroll with his moment of genius from the right sandwiched a converted free from Eoghan Frayne to make it 0-3 to 1-8.

Conor Frayne added to Summerhill's tally, but that was their last score for almost 13 minutes as Quinn landed one from play and from a free, while Smullen kicked his sublime score to make it 0-6 to 1-9 - game on with 10 minutes to go?

After wasting a number of decent chances Summerhill eventually got on the board again as Jack Davies fired a scrappy goal to put an end to any outside hopes Ballinabrackey held.

Quinn responded with a free for Ballinabrackey, but the closing minutes were scrappy with Eoghan Frayne converting three frees and one from play to widen Summerhill's advantage and give them the silverware.

Summerhill - Sean Muddiman; Iarla Hughes, Ronan Ryan (1-0), Jack Bannon; Adam McDonnell, Ross Ryan, Conor Ryan; Adam Flanagan, Micheal Byrne; David Larkin, Kevin Lyons, Kevin Ryan; Eoghan Frayne (0-8 seven frees), Barry Dardis (0-2 one free), Conor Frayne (0-2). Subs - Sean Dalton for Lyons 41m, Eamonn Ryan for K Ryan 49m, Jack Davies (1-0) for C Ryan 52m, Ross Tallon for Dardis 57m.

Ballinabrackey - Dean Pluck; Conor Ennis, Chris O'Connor, Adam O'Brien; Mark Coffey, Nicky Joyce, Sean Fitzpatrick; Damien Carroll (0-1), Michael Kearney; Sean Coffey, David Carroll, Sean Bannon; Shay Curry, Danny Quinn (0-4 three frees), Sean Kavanagh. Subs - Niall Smullen (0-2) for Curry 30m, Barry Thompson for Fitzpatrick 35m, Gavin Quinn for Bannon 41m, Andrew O'Brien for Adam O'Brien, Simon Finn for Kavanagh both 57m.

Referee - Joseph Curran (St Michael's).