'Hurt' from last year's defeat helped drive on Kilcormac/Killoughey

THE hurt from the defeat to Shinrone in last year's county final helped drive on Kilcormac/Killoughey in avenging that defeat in Sunday's county final at St Brendan's Park, Birr, according to team capain Conor Slevin.

Reflecting on their fifth county title success, the Kilcormac/Killoughey netminder said he was delighted to lead the team to victory and noted all the hard work from the beginning of the year got its reward with a double success at Senior A and B level.

“We are a long time on the road this year,” Conor said. “We got back in the field last January. We were hurt after last year and we put everything we could into it and we got what we wanted in the end, a Senior B and Senior A championship.”

Kilcormac/Killoughey came out of the blocks like a shot and had five points on the board inside the first six minutes. “We had a game plan and it was all based around work rate and in fairness there are older lads in that dressing room and there are younger lads in that dressing room and everyone one of them stood up and said we weren't going to be outworked on that field and it showed out there, every one of them worked from start to finish,” Conor said.

Having got their early five points, Kilcormac/Killoughey pushed on and built up their lead.

“That's it. With a team like Shinrone if you give them a chance and ease off on them, they are going to come straight back into the game. They are county champions for a reason, they are a right good side and we just knew that we had to keep the foot down and luckily enough we did keep the foot down and powered on through,” he said.

The winners were clinical in taking their chances and never relented. “We kept the scoreboard ticking over, very few wides, everyone was working hard,” said Conor. “The full forward line, Charlie Mitchell, James Gorman, Adam Screeney, really set the tone out there, they worked from start to finish and that really helped us.”

The goalkeeper agreed that 3-26 in an hour's hurling was a great score. “It was 1-17 at half time which was a fair score to put up in half an hour's hurling,” he added.

That total was helped greatly by the goal they scored just before half time. “We were delighted to get the goal. For an opposition team it is a sucker punch to get a goal like that just before half time. We were saying we had to feed our full forward line and if we fed them enough ball we thought we would get the scores and they did.”

Straight after half time Kilcormac/Killoughey pushed on and never Shinrone get a foothold in the game. “At half time we sat down in the dressing room and we relaxed things again and we said we just had to keep the scoreboard ticking over, that we can't let them back into it, that we need to get a couple of scores early and push on. Late on they got a couple of goals but we were happy enough we were comfortable at that stage. They are a fine team, they were county champions for a reason and they are a young team and they will be back again,” he noted.

The Kilcormac/Killoughey on Sunday showed that potential that is in this team and one that is capable of making a strong challenge in the upcoming Leinster Club championship.

“We have 40 something lads in the field, we have a serious selection, after winning the Senior B and Senior A, we didn't take our eyes of what was going ahead this weekend. We will enjoy ourselves for a few days now and we'll go back in next weekend and go back at it again,” Conor said.