Mellows come up well short against classy Cuala

Cuala (Dublin) 1-17

Liam Mellows 0-11

THERE are times when you are just beaten by a better team and this was certainly the case for Liam Mellows in their All-Ireland senior club semi-final against reigning champions Cuala at Semple Stadium, Thurles last Saturday.

Yes, the scoreline denoting a nine-point defeat may in one sense appear harsh on the Galway champions but, at the same time, you never really felt they were operating on a plane where they could overturn the Dublin and Leinster holders.

This was underlined by the fact that Liam Mellows never led in this contest – indeed, they could not even bring it back on level terms – having fallen behind to early points from Cuala’s Dublin stars, David Treacy, Mark Schutte and Con O’Callaghan.

Given Liam Mellows inability to do the same at the other end of the field, it would be easy to dismiss their display on these shortcomings alone but, it must be remembered, they were meeting a Cuala side who had tore it up in front of the posts against the Kilkenny, Wexford and Offaly champions in their Leinster campaign.

O’Callaghan had been in particularly prolific form in open play but, on Saturday, Mellows held him to four points. They restricted Mark Schutte, Nicky Kenny and Darragh O’Connell to a point apiece while also keeping Colm Cronin and Jake Malone scoreless.

Indeed, as the game entered injury-time, Mellows had limited Cuala to 16 points and if manager Louis Mulqueen had been told before the fixture that Cuala would only post that amount in normal time, one suspects he would certainly have taken it as it would, rightly, have meant Liam Mellows were in with a fighting chance.

Full report in this week’s Connacht Tribune