Shinrone manager acknowledged “absolutely awesome” performance by Kilcormac/Killoughey

SHINRONE manager Trevor Fletcher had absolutely no qualms about the result of Sunday's county final and said the best team “won by a mile”.

Shinrone had a good year as county champions and he had great praise for the efforts of his side in getting back to a county final and said they now had to build on what they had achieved to ensure they picked themselves up and got back there again.

The Roscrea native, who lined out for Kilcormac/Killoughey himself for many years, had great praise for his former side and the way they played.

“K/K were absolutely awesome, one of the best team performances I have seen in a long, long time,” Trevor said. “They outworked us, outfought us. At half time we had nine turnovers but K/K forced the nine turnovers. For me no qualms whatsoever, the best team won by a mile.”

Kilcormac/Killoughey hit Shinrone straight from the start with five points in just over five minutes and Shinrone struggled to get a foothold in the game at all.

“To be fair to them, it is something that we thrived on all year that we were anticipating the ball and winning the breaking ball. Today we won none, K/K were anticipating everything today and they got the breaking ball. People say you get luck but they made their own luck in my opinion. They forced us to make mistakes and they were anticipating the breaking ball and they were very clinical when they got in front of the goals. They passed the ball to the right man every time,” Trevor said.

Kilcormac/Killoughey had 12 points on the board before they registered their first wide. “Yeah, that's how clinical they were,” he said. “Shinrone – the only disappointing thing for me is for them because that performance is not them. No qualms, K/K outfought, outthought us today.”

Shinrone were hanging on Kilcormac/Killoughey's coat tails approaching half time but then conceded a goal, quickly followed by four points, which knocked the stuffing out of them.

“Absolutely, that was the sucker punch,” Trevor said. “There were seven or eight points in it and all of a sudden they got that goal and you're 14 points down at half time. We were calm enough at half time, we spoke about the mistakes we were making and talked about the way we felt we were going to change it around but K/K didn't let us and that is the bottom line.”

Defeat brings an end to Shinrone's year as champions and Trevor felt they gave a good account of themselves over the year.

“I spoke about it earlier on, for me the big thing for them was to get back to the final and they did,” Trevor said. “We were looking for a performance, it didn't happen, but for them at least it proves that they just didn't win a county final and not get to the next one. I always say it is harder to get to a county final the year after you win it because you have a target on your back and teams are going to look to take you down.

“For me, they won games they never would have won in previous years and that is probably on the back of the confidence of winning the county final the previous year. For me now, something Shinrone have to do is stick together and make sure they get back and stick their hand up again next year,” the manager concluded.