\u200b\u200bElectric Ireland Leinster MFC final<\/p>\n
Kildare 2-13 Meath 1-16<\/p>\n
After extra time<\/p>\n
Kildare win 5-3 on penalties<\/p>\n
By Paul Keane at Laois Hire O’Moore Park, Portlaoise<\/p>\n
Over two hours after this Electric Ireland Leinster MFC final started, they were still duking it out in Portlaoise.<\/p>\n
It came down to penalties in the end and Kildare held their nerve, slotting all five of theirs to take the title for the first time since 2019.<\/p>\n
It’s their 10th provincial win in all and Lilywhites supporters who held their breath throughout a tense shoot-out were left to marvel at the impact of a couple of key players.<\/p>\n
Greg Kelly was the player of the match with a crucial 1-2 but this landmark win – which has secured Kildare an All-Ireland quarter-final clash with Munster runners-up Kerry on the first weekend of June – wouldn’t have been possible without Logan Tennyson either.<\/p>\n
Brought on early in the second half of normal time, the St Kevin’s teenager firstly broke Meath hearts by forcing extra time with a late 1-1.<\/p>\n
Then after 20 extra minutes he popped up with another equaliser, this time a pointed free, to force the game to spot kicks.<\/p>\n
Tennyson was one of the five Kildare penalty takers to convert their kicks too, with goalkeeper Joe Crotty pulling off a crucial save from Meath captain Harry McGuirk.<\/p>\n
That was unfortunate for McGuirk after a powerful performance but Meath are still alive in the All-Ireland series at least and will face Munster champions Cork.<\/p>\n
Kildare had five points to spare when the sides previously met in early April in Skryne, the home club of Meath manager Trevor Giles.<\/p>\n
That was Meath’s second loss after defeat to Louth so they had to beat Laois in their last group game just to advance.<\/p>\n
But they did so in style, slamming in five goals and they added six more against Wicklow, five against Offaly and two in the semi-final win over Dublin.<\/p>\n
The only blot on Kildare’s copybook was a group game loss to Louth, a result they avenged with a 1-11 to 0-10 semi-final win.<\/p>\n
They got the brighter start this time too, sniping early points from Eoghan Lyons and Jack Reilly.<\/p>\n
Wind-assisted Kildare were the better side for the first 25 minutes too but a fourth minute Liam O’Donoghue goal kept Meath in it.<\/p>\n
And when the Royals finished out the half with points from Milo Stafford and Conn Brennan, they tied it up at 1-5 to 0-8.<\/p>\n
That was more than acceptable from their perspective considering the wind and a couple of decent point chances, and a goal opportunity, that Kildare wasted.<\/p>\n
The third quarter was tense and the sides split four points between them, Jack Reilly with a couple of Kildare points from frees, 1-7 to 0-10.<\/p>\n
That’s when Meath came alive with their best passage of play, reeling off four more points without response.<\/p>\n
McGuirk pulled the strings as Stafford, Leo Kavanagh, Brennan and Cormac Walsh finished off sweet moves, leaving Meath 1-11 to 0-10 up deep into stoppage time.<\/p>\n
But Kildare simply refused to relent and when Fiachra Martin’s shot at goal was blocked, Tennyson swept up the crumbs and fired to the net.<\/p>\n
Almost inevitably, Kildare then conjured the equaliser four minutes into stoppage time, Tennyson the hero again as he tied it up at 1-12 to 1-12 with a rifled point from close range.<\/p>\n
They scored a point each in the first half of extra time – which suited Meath as they’d played into the wind.<\/p>\n
The Royals thought they’d won it when they cancelled out Kelly’s well-worked 74th minute goal with four points, including a two-pointer from Stafford.<\/p>\n
But Tennyson intervened again, curling over the leveller from a free that was won by Kelly to set up the penalty shoot out.<\/p>\n
Tennyson, Lyons, Reilly, Callum Cowzer and Luke Shanahan all converted from the spot for Kildare while goalkeeper Crotty made an excellent save to deny McGuirk who was taking Meath’s second penalty.<\/p>\n
Kildare scorers: Greg Kelly 1-2, Logan Tennyson 1-2 (0-1f), Jack Reilly 0-5 (0-4f), Eoghan Lyons 0-2 (0-1f), Fionn Lawlor 0-1, P\u00e1id\u00ed Ryan 0-1.<\/p>\n
Meath scorers: Milo Stafford 0-6 (0-3f, 1 tp), Liam O’Donoghue 1-0, Conn Brennan 0-3, Harry McGuirk 0-3, Cormac Fitzsimons 0-1, 1f, Leo Kavanagh 0-1, Cormac Walsh 0-1, Tom\u00e1s Dillon 0-1.<\/p>\n
Kildare: Joe Crotty; Luke Shanahan, Ryan Crawford, Eoin Markey; Fionn Lawlor, Jack Doran, Liam Mescal; Charlie Doran, P\u00e1id\u00ed Ryan; Jamie Flood, Greg Kelly, Eoghan Lyons; Jack Reilly, Aidan Tobin, Cian Kehoe.<\/p>\n
Subs: Logan Tennyson for Flood 35, Aodh\u00e1n Bergin for Tobin 46, Fiachra Martin for Kehoe 54, Rory Cooke for Ryan 59. Gear\u00f3id Clare for Lawlor 70, Callum Cowzer for Doran 74.<\/p>\n
Meath: Cormac Fitzsimons; Ben Browne, Tom\u00e1s Clarke, Niall Rogan; Liam O’Donoghue, John Killoran, Niall Smyth; Cormac McKenna, Conn Brennan; Harry McGuirk, Tom\u00e1s Proudfoot, Alex Keane; Cormac Walsh, Milo Stafford, Dara Loughran.<\/p>\n
Subs: Leo Kavanagh for Proudfoot 43, Thomas McKeever for Loughran 52, Harry Keating for Browne 62, Tom\u00e1s Dillon for Walsh 62. Loughran for Killoran 83, Dillon Glynn for Rogan 83.<\/p>\n
Ref: Enda Kelly (Westmeath).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u200b\u200bElectric Ireland Leinster MFC final Kildare 2-13 Meath 1-16 After extra time Kildare win 5-3 on penalties By…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":462438,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,60,43],"class_list":["post-462437","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/462437","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=462437"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/462437\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/462438"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=462437"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=462437"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=462437"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}