Ardrahan pay the price for absence of influential duo

Athenry 1-16

Ardrahan 0-12

The importance inter-county players make to the ability of a club side to perform to a certain level cannot be understated, and we were given a reminder of this in Loughrea on Saturday as Athenry handed out a seven-point defeat to Ardrahan.

Ardrahan’s chances of making it out of Group B of the Senior Hurling Championship are all but gone, but fate ruled against them at the weekend. The losses of Johnny Glynn and Iarla Tannian would severely cripple any club side in Ireland, and Ardrahan had to make do without the duo against Athenry, while corner-forward Maurice Callanan was also unavailable.

Glynn is out of the country, as he has moved to the US since the All-Ireland hurling final, while injury ruled Tannian out of this fixture. Athenry follower’s hopes would have risen when they saw the Galway centre-half back walking on to the pitch after his teammates carrying the spare hurls before throw-in.

That Ardrahan should turn up to Loughrea in worse shape than Athenry had an ironic feel to it, considering the rumour last week that they weren’t going to fulfil the fixture at all. When the teams were originally scheduled to meet on July 12, Athenry refused to play because of the fact that Tom Flynn was in Armagh lining out for the Galway footballers that very day in the All-Ireland Championship.

You could understand Athenry’s position, but Ardrahan were awarded the two points for the match at the time. Athenry appealed the decision, and were successful, which led us back to last Saturday, just over two months on. Thankfully, the farcical situation that marred the Senior Hurling Championship of 2015 was avoided by Ardrahan’s decision to play the game.

Both teams hadn’t played a Senior Championship game since the weekend of May 9th/10th. Consequently, they both looked a touch off the pace required, but without their aforementioned star duo, it was Ardrahan who understandably lacked leadership and a focal point more. The likes of Jason Kennedy, Cormac Diviney and Damien O’Shaughnessy tried to get them going, but it wasn’t to be.

The game had an expected bit of niggle to it, as evidenced by the nine yellow cards brandished by the man in the middle, John Keane. Tom Flynn also received some ‘special’ attention shortly before the final whistle. Gerry Hennelly was particularly fortunate not to be given a harsher sanction, after an over-zealous pull that connected with Flynn’s leg in the 57th minute.

As a spectacle, the game wasn’t of the highest quality. Athenry hit the opening four and concluding four points, but it was stop-start in nature. Cathal Keane and Jason Kennedy had a personal duel going on in terms of the placed ball scoring. Keane nailed eight for Athenry, while Kennedy got nine for Ardrahan.

Athenry named Dara Glynn at full-forward, but immediately dropped him back to the full-back line, where he picked up Stephen Whelan. This in turn freed Shane Donoghue to be the extra man in defence, a task which suited him.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.