Joyce a man apart

Date Published: 01-Nov-2007

YOU’D know that Killererin had been here before. County finals days are nothing new to them and having come through a marathon six match campaign in reaching last Sunday’s decider at Pearse Stadium, they were sufficiently battle-hardened and honed to cope with anything Milltown — appearing in their first Galway football showdown for two decades — would throw at them.

Only two points separated the protagonists at the finish but, in reality, it was never really that close.

Killererin were nearly always ahead and though they, perhaps, retreated more than was necessary or prudent during the secondhalf, there is no better team around for protecting a lead.

Killererin are streetwise and the big difference between the finalists on Sunday was craft and experience.

Led magnificently by team captain Padraic Joyce, who rolled back the years with a towering Man of the Match display, Killererin had the hard work done at the interval.

Six points clear on a hostile, windy day, not usually associated with high scoring affairs, it then became a question of ‘what we have, we hold’ for Stephen Flaherty’s men.

With the versatile…..