Coolera-Strandhill 0-08 Shamrock Gaels 2-11<\/p>\n
Shamrock Gaels ended a senior championship famine going back to 1992 when they reclaimed the Owen B Hunt Cup thanks to a brilliant dismissal of holders Coolera-Strandhill in the Sligo SFC final replay at Quigabar.<\/p>\n
Led by Ciaran Kenny, who was outstanding at centre-back, with Conor Sheridan and Shane Deignan, scorer of 2-03, also impressing, Shamrock Gaels reached Sligo’s summit via a cohesive second-half display.<\/p>\n
In blustery conditions at the west Sligo venue, everything pointed to another close encounter between these well-matched sides, with a replay needed due to Shamrock Gaels\u2019 talisman David Quinn\u2019s two-pointer free conversion deep into second-half stoppage time two weeks previously.<\/p>\n
The first-half fodder was definitely tit for tat and also mistake for mistake as neither side was capable of taking a proper hold of proceedings as the crossfield breeze was a factor in this.<\/p>\n
Coolera-Strandhill, looking for a third successive Owen B Hunt Cup, could have had the perfect start but their star forward Niall Murphy was wide with a penalty effort in the sixth minute as he faced off against his Sligo teammate Daniel Lyons, the Shamrock Gaels custodian.<\/p>\n
Midway through the first-half Murphy was again cursing his luck – this time when a point attempt came off the upright – but the sharpshooter did land a brace of points as Coolera-Strandhill found joy when getting direct ball into their top scorer.<\/p>\n
The first-half ended level, however, 0-2 apiece, with Shamrock Gaels, who last won this trophy in 1992, matching their opponents courtesy of neat finishes from Shane Deigan.<\/p>\n
Both sides went in at half-time annoyed with their shooting (four wides each) and a potential turning point – aside from the missed penalty – was when Keelan Cawley burst through for Coolera-Strandhill but Ciaran Kenny shut down the danger.<\/p>\n
Shamrock Gaels set the tone for the second-half by reeling off three points without return within six minutes of the restart thanks to Karl McKenna, Shane Deignan and Patrick Kenny.<\/p>\n
A red card after 41 minutes for Coolera-Strandhill\u2019s Leo Doherty swung the pendulum firmly towards Shamrock Gaels, who extended their lead with a point from Ciaran Kenny, who was later named Player of the Match.<\/p>\n
Coolera-Strandhill responded with a two-pointer free from Niall Murphy – one of three such efforts that he landed in the second-half – but the holders were losing duels all over the pitch.<\/p>\n
A hat-trick of points from Shamrock Gaels captain David Quinn as well as a vital interception from goalkeeper Daniel Lyons kept the contenders on course for a famous victory.<\/p>\n
Coolera-Strandhill were struggling and their goose was well and truly cooked when Shane Deignan netted in the 59th minute – he would add another three-pointer in stoppage time to complete a wonderful outcome for Shamrock Gaels.<\/p>\n
It was a unique occasion, too, for the Kenny household due to three brothers, Patrick, Ciaran and Niall, starting for Shamrock Gaels – their brother is of course Glasgow Celtic and former Sligo Rovers and Shamrock Rovers ace Johnny Kenny.<\/p>\n
Coolera-Strandhill: Keelan Harte, Jonathan Cassidy, Conor McDonagh, Sean Murphy, Oran Harte, Peter Laffey, Cathal Gilligan, Kevin Banks, Mark McDaniel, Leo Doherty, Barry O\u2019Mahony, Ross Doherty, Keelan Cawley, Niall Murphy (0-08, 3tpf), Conor Burke<\/p>\n
Subs: Cormac Murphy for Keelan Cawley, 43; Cillian O\u2019Neill for Sean Murphy, 46; Hugh Rooney for Jonathan Cassidy, 57<\/p>\n
Shamrock Gaels: Daniel Lyons; Oisin Conlon, Evan Lyons, Daniel King; Karl McKenna, Ciaran Kenny, Patrick Kenny; Conor Sheridan, Dillon McDermott; Niall Kenny, Lee Deignan, George Barlow; Shane Deignan, David Quinn, James Foley<\/p>\n
Subs: Sean Carroll for James Foley, 44<\/p>\n
Referee: Barry Judge<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Coolera-Strandhill 0-08 Shamrock Gaels 2-11 Shamrock Gaels ended a senior championship famine going back to 1992 when they…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":105433,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-105432","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105432","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=105432"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105432\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/105433"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=105432"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=105432"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=105432"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}