There’s no need for such cruelty

MEATH… 1-16

KILDARE… 2-13 *

*Kildare win 5-3 on penalties

There’s no need for such cruelty to be used to decide games of such magnitude on penalties. Another case of the GAA hierarchy bowing to the whingers. ‘Fixing’ something that wasn’t even broken. Right here, right now, let it be made abundantly clear, these misgivings are not being aired because Meath lost.

We were beaten because we hadn’t the street smarts to close out the job. Whether that’s on the part of the players or the sideline, you can make your own call.

Four points up with two minutes to go in normal time and two up with the same to go in extra time, there’s simply no excuse for not getting the job done.

Foul early and foul often and foul tactically. An accumulation of cards would be well worth it if they were swapped for a platter of medals.

That said, Trevor Giles’s young troops created an amplitude of chances to have business well taken care of before extra time or spot kicks were anywhere on the horizons.

After Liam O’Donoghue netted inside a minute owing to a blunder by the Kildare custodian, Meath actually didn’t kick on as much as might have been the case. Still, with points from Harry McGuirk, Conn Brennan and Milo Stafford meant Trevor’s troops with in at parity – 1-05  to 0-08 – despite having played against the wind.

As one might have expected, the young green and golds had the upper hand for much of the second half and scores from McGuirk, Stafford, Brennan, Cormac Walsh and the introduced Leo Kavanagh appeared to have put the Fr Larry Murray Cup into green and gold ribbons, until the introduced Logan Tennyson pilfered a goal and point out of nothing to earn a reprieve for the all whites it would be hard to argue didn’t deserve.

Kildare won all three coin tosses on the night (the last being for what end the penalties would be kicked into). And again, they would play with wind advantage in the first of the two additional ten minute periods.

But once more Giles’s gang hung in there, with the result that, with only ten minutes left to avoid needing penalties, the teams were still deadlocked.

Again with the change of direction, the 2020 and 2021 winners of this competition appeared to have swung the pendulum to their advantage, with classy converted frees from custodian Cormac Fitzsimons and Stafford from the ‘Wood and fine efforts from play from the outstanding Alex Keane and sub Tomas Dillon appeared to have eventually got Meath over the line.

But no. Even though the allotted three minutes overtime had elapsed after Callum Cowzer had clipped over a point for the whites, play continued and Greg Kelly all too easily managed to slalom through the Meath defence and plant a rocket past Fitzsimons and put everything on the spot.

Penalties are an unnecessarily rotten way to decide any competition and it was always going to be devastating for whichever side did end up on the wrong end thereof, but I do feel particularly crestfallen for the immense Harry McGuirk.

The O’Mahonys man has been imperious throughout the campaign to date, was again tonight and our skipper didn’t deserve what fate dealt him at the end tonight.

SCORERS – M. Stafford (0-6, 1x2PT, 3F), L. O’Donoghue (1-0), H. McGuirk and C. Brennan (0-3 each), C. Fitzsimons, C. Walsh, L. Kavanagh and T. Dillon (0-1 each)

MEATH – C. Fitzsimons; B. Browne, T. Clarke, N. Rogan; L. O’Donoghue, J. Killoran, N. Smyth; C. McKenna, C. Brennan; A. Keane, T. Proudfoot, H. McGuirk; C. Walsh, M. Stafford, D. Loughran.

SUBS – L. Kavanagh for Proudfoot, T. Dillon for Walsh, H. Keating for Browne, T. McKeever for Loughran, Loughran for Killoran, D. Glynn for Rogan.

Referee – Enda Kelly (Westmeath)

FOGRA – Meath’s disappointment at coming up short will also be laced with a little irony as among the Kildare players playing their part was Fiachra Martin. Son of former Meath goalkeeper Conor and his wife Louise (Nee Keague), nephew of former Meath player and selector Tom Keague and grandson of Oliver who captained Dunboyne to win the Feis Cup in 1958.