St. Thomas’ get stuck in the starting stalls at Semple

Inside Track with John McIntyre

IT’S not difficult to imagine the over-riding emotion in the St Thomas’ camp this week – ‘if we could only play that match all over again’. Sadly, sport doesn’t work like that and the Galway hurling champions will be left with a bagful of regrets over their two-point loss to Ballyea in the All-Ireland club semi-final at Semple Stadium last Saturday.

St Thomas’ may have finished in a blaze of glory – incredibly, they outscored the Clare men by 1-9 to 0-2 from the 49th minute to the finish – but too much damage had already been done to their title hopes. They only managed a paltry three points in the opening-half and, to all intents and purposes, were being given a hurling lesson.

They failed to come out of the starting blocks and just weren’t anywhere near as match sharp as Ballyea. St Thomas’ were chasing shadows for three-quarters of the match; made numerous unforced errors; couldn’t get to grips with the opposition’s outstanding pair of Niall Deasy and Tony Kelly; while several of their own key players were struggling to make an impact.

To compound matters, Conor Clooney had a nightmare evening from the placed ball before being belatedly removed from his agony by Darragh Burke, who missed nothing after that and had got to the pitch of battle much quicker than the vast majority of his team-mates. It didn’t help St Thomas’ cause either that Galway captain David Burke was rarely the dominating force his team needed him to be.

Ironically, it was only when St Thomas’ pushed Eanna Burke and James Regan up the field to more familiar attacking roles that they gained some traction. On their way to county title glory last Autumn, much had been made of the major positional reshuffling carried out by John Burke and his mentors, and though it clearly served a purpose in reviving their challenge in Galway, it didn’t work in Thurles.

Burke was wasted at corner back and Regan was part of a half-back line which was in all kinds of difficulty in the opening 30 minutes. It may have been desperation stuff that saw them move forward, but it’s no coincidence that St Thomas’ caught fire all of a sudden after facing down the barrel of a heavy defeat when behind 1-17 to 1-5 with only 11 minutes of normal time remaining.

Almost, in the blink of an eye, St Thomas’ were transformed. The Cooney boys in the half-backline, Donal and Shane, thundered into the game, both scoring rousing points, while Regan, Darragh Burke (4), Eanna Burke and the lively Kenneth Burke also split the posts to close the gap to 1-18 to 1-14.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.