Electric Ireland All-Ireland Minor Football Championship Final

Kerry 3-7 Galway 0-9

By John Harrington at Croke Park

Kerry won an impressive third Electric Ireland All-Ireland Minor Football Championship in a row in Croke Park today, but they were made to work hard for it by a tigerish Galway side.

The final winning margin was comfortable enough in the end for Kerry, but this game was still in the melting pot until David Clifford scored an outrageously brilliant goal for the Kingdom late in the second-half.

Galway had been coming on strong at that stage in the game but Clifford’s sucker-punch floored them.
Until then their hard-working, counter-attacking strategy put them in with a shout of pulling off a big shock, but Clifford proved there is no substitute for pure class.

Kerry had won their five matches on the way to this All-Ireland Final by an average of 14 points, so it was hardly a surprise that Galway set up with a safety-first approach from the start.

Full-forwards Seán Raftery played deep as a sweeper, they defended in numbers and tackled with great tenacity.

That Galway grittiness combined with a slippery sod meant that Kerry struggled to find their usual rhythm for most of the first half and as a spectacle it as far from the free-flowing, high-scoring encounter most had predicted.

Seán O’Shea did open the scoring for Kerry after two minutes, but another 17 would elapse before the scoreboard operator would be called into action again.

Galway were frustrating Kerry, but their good-work in defence was being undone by some poor shooting at the other end of the field when they successfully created scoring opportunities on the counter-attack.

They were made pay for that profligacy when Kerry scored the first goal of the match after 19 minutes, in slightly fortuitous circumstances.

Centre-forward O’Shea was almost certainly shooting for a point when he kicked the ball-goalwards from 35 yards out, but it landed in the small square and wing-forward Diarmuid O’Connor had timed his run perfectly to get his fist to the ball and direct it past Galway goalkeeper Cormac Haslam.

Galway finally got a score of their own a couple of minutes later when a surging run from Ryan Forde earned a free that Desmond Conneely converted.

Moments later though the Tribesmen were reeling again when Kerry scored their second goal of the match. And, once again, they made good use of their height advantage against a Galway full-back line conceding inches in all positions.

This time David Clifford won a high delivery into the box and immediately hand-pass to full-forward David Shaw who finished low and hard to the net. For those of you who like tracing the GAA Gene, Shaw is a first-cousin of Mayo footballers Aidan, Séamus, and Conor O'Shea. 

Galway midfielder Céin D’Arcy hit back with Galway’s first score from play, but Kerry and Shaw had the last say of the half with a really classy, curling point.

Six points down at the break, 2-2 to 0-2, Galway required a strong start to the second half if they were going to make a match of this, and they got it by scoring two fine points within a minute of the resumption.

First wing-back Adam Quirke charged forward and arced over a lovely right-footed effort on the run. Possession was won again straight from the resultant kick-out, and when the ball was transferred to Robert Finnerty he made no mistake from close range.

Kerry were looking a little bit rattled all of a sudden, a poor wide from the normally lethal Clifford summing up their state of mind.

Finnerty reduced the gap to just three points to a free, before Kerry finally got some sort of purchase on the game again when defender Niall Collins charged forward and pointed from a tight angle to show his forwards how it was done.

The Kingdom still didn’t look as comfortable as we’ve become used to seeing them this year though, and a point from Ryan Forde and another free from Finnerty meant Galway were still within three by the mid-way point of the second-half, as they trailed by 2-4 to 0-7.

A buzz went through the ground when Desmond Connelly then cut the deficit to two with another free, as Galway and Mayo supporters alike roared on the boys from the West.

But just when it looked like the underdogs were building up a real head of steam, Clifford settled the game with a piece of individual brilliance.

He’s been Kerry’s key player all year but was finding the going tough in this match against Galway’s number three Seán Mulkerrin, a hardy bit of stuff from the Aran Islands.

Clifford's moment came though when he moved out to wing-forward and Mulkerrin passed him on rather than continue to shadow him.

A promising Galway attack broke down when two players went for the same ball and allowed Kerry to turn it over, and when it was cleared to Clifford on the wing he put his head down and ran straight at the Galway goals.

He covered around 40 yards at high speed before he unleashed a blistering shot right into the top left-corner of the net past a helpless Cormac Haslam. Pure quality.

Kerry now had a five-point buffer, and never looked like being caught from there. They finished the match with a flourish as points from Dara Moynihan, Cormack Linnane, and Seán O’Shea put a gloss on the final score-line that was a tad unfair on a gutsy but ultimately outclassed Galway side.

**Scorers for Kerry: **David Shaw 1-1, David Clifford 1-0, Diarmuid O’Connor 1-0, Seán O’Shea 0-2 (2f), Dara Moynihan 0-2, Cormac Linnane 0-1, Niall Collins 0-1.

**Scorers for Galway: **Robert Finnerty 0-3 (2f), Desmond Conneely 0-2 (2f), Ryan Forde 0-1, Céin Darcy 0-1, Adam Quirke 0-1, Rory Cunningham 0-1 (1f)

Kerry: Billy Courtney; David Naughten, Niall Collins, Graham O’Sullivan; Michael Potts, Daniel O’Brien, Mícheál Foley; Mike Breen, Mark Ryan; Dara Moynihan, Seán O’Shea, Diarmuid O’Connor; David Clifford, David Shaw, Brian Friel. Subs: Cormac Linnane for Brian Friel, 48; Caolim Teahan for Niall Collins, 54; Bryan Sweeney for David Shaw, 60; Kieran Dwyer for Micheál Foley, 65; Stefan Okunbor for Diarmuid O’Connor, 67.

Galway: Cormac Haslam; Liam Boyle, Seán Mulkerrin, Eoin McFadden; Adam Quirke, Ernán McDonagh, Fionán Garvey; Céin D’Arcy, John Maher; Finian Ó Laois, Evan Murphy, Ryan Forde; Robert Finnerty, Seán Raftery, Desmond Connelly. Subs: Barry Goldrick for Evan Murphy, 38; Ross Murphy for Séán Raftery, 50; Rory Cunningham for Robert Finnerty, 56; Eoghan Deely for Fionán Garvey, 56.

**Ref: **Ciáran Branagan (Down)