Cynical Carrickshock too streetwise for Kiltale

Cynical Carrickshock claimed a 2-12 to 2-9 Leinster Club IHC semi-final victory at Trim today against naive Kiltale in a totally forgettable encounter that included a free-for-all melee along the sideline in which players and officials from each team were involved.

Poor stewarding along the sideline didn't help either as ugly and ill-tempered exchanges took place close to the full-time whistle but no action was taken by Wexford referee Barry Redmond who displayed too much goodwill.

Out on the pitch the Wexford official was also full of goodwill, although he issued a red card to Carrickshock player John Murphy a couple of minutes from time - Murphy had collected a yellow card in the opening minute following an exchange with Kiltale's Mark O'Sullivan who was also yellow-carded.

That early incident gave an indication of the Carrickshock approach - it wasn't exactly an advertisement for the skills of the game, but it was effective and ultimately helped them to victory.

Kiltale will learn plenty from the Carrikshock experience, they won't have learned too much about hurling, but they certainly received a lesson or two in how to bully the opposition.

The Meath champions tallied 13 wides, went 20 minutes in the first-half without a score and repeated the feat in the second-half, and still managed to stay in contention.

From that perspective, the Kiltale players have every reason to be both disappointed and pleased with their own performance - they never gave up, but could get no fluency into what was effectively a stop-start sort of game with Carrickshock dictating the pattern of play.

Kiltale trailed by five points at the interval (1-3 to 2-5), but blitzed the Kilkenny men in the second-half with five unanswered points, four from Jack Regan and one by Mark O'Sullivan, for parity by the 50th minute.

That focused Carrickshock and when they hurled they were good and they also were able to bring on a player of the stature of All Star Richie Power 12 minutes into the second-half.

Seven unanswered Carrickshock points later Power also had a yellow card to his name - had it been football the colour would have been black - as the Kilkenny men forged 2-12 to 1-8 ahead.

Gritty Kiltale kept battling and a Padraig Kelly point ended the drought with Jack Regan finding the net from a 20-metre free after Murphy departed to that red card.

Six minutes of added time ensured a nervy finish for Carrickshock, but they held on for the victory.

SCORERS
Carrickshock - D Brennan 1-1; M O'Dwyer 1-1; M Rice 0-4; J Butler 0-2; R Power 0-1; K Farrell 0-1; J Power 0-1; D Walsh 0-1.
Kiltale - J Regan 1-6; J Kelly 1-0; E Ryan 0-1; M O'Sullivan 0-1; J Kelly 0-1.