No stopping St. JamesÕ men

Date Published: {J}

Dara Bradley

THE history books will record 2010 as a watershed year for St. James’ GAA club. Just 16 years after Mervue and Renmore amalgamated, the city club last month achieved what it was set-up to do – secure senior status.

And at the weekend, St James’ followed up that fantastic feat with another historic milestone when they were crowned Connacht champions after winning a thrilling decider against what was a strong and much fancied Strokestown outfit.

In doing so, they kept intact their unbeaten record this year in all competitions; more importantly St. James can now look forward to an All-Ireland semi-final clash with the Munster champions in January and then who knows … possibly a final date with destiny at Croke Park in mid-February.

That’s for another day but for now the St. James’ backroom team and panel will just bask in their latest glory – on Sunday at Tuam Stadium, the Galway champions put the icing on the cake of what has been a remarkable season.

The provincial final itself was rousing stuff. St. James hit the ground running and carved out a 0-8 to 0-1 advantage after 25 minutes by playing awesome football and at half time – though they conceded a late penalty goal through a defensive lapse in concentration – looked a safe bet, leading 0-10 to 1-2 at the turnaround.

Roscommon champions Strokestown came at them in waves after the interval though and were within striking distance of an almighty comeback. But St. James soaked up the pressure, never really panicked and showed an insatiable hunger to win when bouncing back and withstanding the onslaught to finish the stronger.

It’s been a long and hard road back from the bitter defeat to Leitir Mór in last year’s county final, but man-of-the-match Paul Conroy always knew this team had what it takes to recovery and prove themselves on the county and provincial stages.

“Last year was awfully disappointing; we thought we had a great chance going into the county final but in fairness to Leitir Mór they’re a great team and they deserved it. We just dug deeper this year, trained harder and thank god we’re here now – Connacht champions,” a delighted Conroy told Sentinel Sport afterwards.

“We were flying it at the start. We were 0-8 to 0-1 up at one stage, there was no stopping us. The second-half the wind was against us and it seemed to get stronger. Strokestown came back at us and came within one of us and I suppose we were a bit nervous,but thank god we got a point or two then and pulled away.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Sentinel.

See also: St James’ hold their nerve