RATHKENNY (Meath)…3-11
KENAGH (Longford)…1-10
At the outset here, an admission – it’s only very recently I became aware of Kenagh. And that was due to the legend that is Farmer Phil (Stewart) on YouTube and the fact that the family business https://www.stewartfamilyfarmlongford.com/ supply the famed local eatery in the town https://www.facebook.com/macsshack15/ with all their beef products from their home reared, grass fed herd.
After today’s Leinster Club IFC encounter, however, it can be confirmed – not that any such validation was required – that, as well as top notch nosh, the area has produced some fine footballers as well.
Any team which wins a county title at any level has to have them, but, perhaps unbelievably, today was my first time seeing Keith Curtis in action. The corner forward was one of the success stories of the Meath Regional Championship last year and – with his starring role in Rathkenny’s county win – he has surely canvassed Colm O’Rourke for more game time in 2024.
Curtis pointed three times in the opening period, though with Keelan McGann, Shane Farrell and their scorer-in-chief at corner forward, Darren Carberry, causing the Rathkenny rearguard no end of problems, Eugene McCormack’s charges deservedly open up a lead of 1-03 to 0-03 early on.
A wise man once said that you never see a bookie on a bicycle. Inference being that they win the battle with punters more often than happens the other way around. But you do have to wonder how they price up some events.
Rathkenny were 1/33 favourites before throw in. Questioning that being the case is in no way doubting the credentials of the red and blacks from the Royal County. Rather, underlining how downright insulting the pricing up was to the Longford representatives.
Something underlined by the fact that they had opened up a lead of 1-06 to 0-05 on the lead in to half time. Brian Meade and Daniel Gavigan had pointed along with Curtis but the really crucial score from their perspective came when the very impressive Oisin Cummins-Fuller latched onto a loose ball and netted to leave just the minimum in it at the break.
You suspect the Donal Keogan-captained outfit got a fair rev up from their often firey manager Donal Curtis and if that was the case it certainly had the desired effect as the very impressive Jack Gore restored parity rapidly after the restart.
Gore wasn’t done scoring then by any means, but the real turning point arrived when corner forward Aaron Johnson took advantage of dithering in the Kenagh defence to raise another green flag and leave the scoreboars reading 2-07 to 1-06 in his side’s favour.
To their credit, the home side kept chipping away and the very accurate Carberry did his best to keep them in it but any chance of a turnaround was finally quelled when Rathkenny’s goal machine – the introduced Eoin Heavey – did what he does best!
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