The All Ireland Post Primary Schools Senior Croke Cup Final certainly lived up to it’s billing at Semple Stadium on Saturday but unfortunately for St Kierans it ended in a narrow defeat.
St. Kierans manager Tom Hogan says they are really proud of the fact that the players gave it everything as their attempt for a 4th consecutive Senior Alll-Ireland title came up short by two points on Saturday.
Speaking to KCLR after Saturday’s defeat to Our Ladys Templemore, Tom says the Templemore school were fully deserving of their victory.
“When you realize that everyone put everything on the line, I mean everyone left everything on the field, that’s all you can expect. The boys were absolutely excellent, really really proud of every player from 1-35 today, they put in a fantastic effort in during the year, they got to the final.
“We knew we would be up against it against Our Ladys and we went in and gave it our best shot and look we came up a bit short but look that’s sport, that’s life. Since the start of the year, they were probably favorites to win the Harty and probably favorites to win the All-Ireland, they are an excellent team, we knew that and they were the team to beat and that’s how it proved today.
“We have to give great credit to the team, they were very good and they deserved their victory.” he said
Meanwhile, selector Michael Walsh says the experience of the Templemore school from having played them in last years Semi-Final was a telling factor.
“For these lads it was a massive day to be playing in Thurles. A lot of them wouldn’t have experienced anything like this before so there is a certain element of nerves and you just don’t know how lads are going to react on the day.
“In fairness to most of them it took some of them maybe 5 or 10 minutes just to relax and get into the game. We couldn’t have any quibs about anyone there. They all gave their everything and just again experience does tell a lot and we came up against Templemore there last year in the Semi-Final and we were very lucky to beat them and you could tell a lot of their lads they were just kind of assured in everything they did” he concluded.
Michael O’Leary & Michael Walsh were on commentary duty for KCLR Sport on Saturday and you can listen back to the action here.
