Gavin O’Connor analyses the Austin Stacks game on Sunday and picks out the main talking points…
Conor Jordan tackles Liam Jennings of Ballincollig during the match on Sunday. Photo by Dermot Crean
1. The slow start
The Rock had to endure a very nervy opening first 20 minutes. Ballincollig, outscored Stacks by a score 1-4 to 0-1 and on balance, you had to say the Kerry champions were lucky with that.
If it wasn’t for some last-ditch tackling by the likes of Fearghal McNamara and the Shanahan brothers, it really could have been a whole lot worse.
They sustained a major onslaught from Ballincollig’s running game, but in truth were only really breached once when Pa Kelly struck for a goal. From that point on, the Stacks full back line performed exceptionally well.
Continued below…
The Kieran Donaghy switch from full-forward was a pivotal move. Photo by Dermot Crean
2. Donaghy’s switch
It wasn’t going well for Donaghy inside the first 20 minutes when Ballincollig were well on top. Finally, he came up against a side that double marked him while he was in full forward.
Ballincollig’s Stephen O’Donoghue was stuck to him like glue and was the first player this year to really get the better of Donaghy in a big game.
Eventually, enough was enough and ‘Star’ was moved back to midfield. From that point on Stacks got a grip around the centre of the park. For the second half he was pushed even further back to act as a sweeper to clear up any danger Ballincollig could mount. It worked a treat as the Cork side scored only five points from then on.
3. Risky business by Stacks
With about 10 minutes left in normal time Stacks attempted to run out the clock. Stephen Stack, spoke directly after the match and explained why they opted to do this.
“I actually complimented my players at the end of normal time for not giving away the ball,” he said. “Ballincollig were playing 11 or 13 men behind the ball. We had six forwards maybe with two players on them, so there was no point kicking it in. Ballincollig are an excellent attacking team and at that stage our legs were tired,” said Stack.
To attempt to see out the game in this manner was risky and ugly from a spectator’s point of view, but they nearly pulled it off only for a heroic score by John Miskella. In some quarters that would have been seen as just desserts.
Greg Horan was outstanding on Sunday. Photo by Dermot Crean
4. Greg Horan’s performance
I think on Sunday we saw a footballer come of age. At only 19, Greg Horan put down a man-of-the-match performance far beyond his years.
When trailing by five points in the first half, the Kerry U21 got the ball rolling on the fight back when he dummied his man to slot the ball over from 30 yards.
A couple of minutes later, Horan, who was instrumental in the Rockie fightback turned provider with an inch perfect pass for David Mannix to score.
These are just two moments in a game he stamped quality all over.
Horan scored two points and had one disallowed because of what appears to have been a mix up on the line. He was reintroduced in extra-time and burst onto the pitch and got free to score a point. Not only were Ballincollig struggling to keep up with him, management and officials were as well.
Rolling back the years…Darragh Long made an impact when he was introduced on Sunday. Photo by Dermot Crean
5. The Bench
Stephen Stack talked after the game saying “we don’t have subs, we have impact players”. Much has been spoken about, The Rock’s young guns and rightly so.
Two men a bit longer in tooth, William Kirby and Darragh Long, had a huge bearing on the game.
In a match where the benches were going to be put under strain, the Stacks players made the greater impact. Darragh Long, kicked two frees and – just as he had done in the county final – got the final score of the match.
William Kirby eased pressure with a couple of fine catches in the dying moments, most of all a sky-scraper of a fetch which lead to Donaghy’s only score. No doubt they will be needed once again if the Rock are to go all the way.
