\n Leinster Club SHC final: St Martin’s (Wexford) 0-24 Shamrocks Ballyhale (Kilkenny) 2-17\u00a0\n <\/p>\n
Not for the first time, a super substitute intervened in stoppage time at Croke Park to deny Shamrocks Ballyhale a major title.<\/p>\n
Harry Ruddle memorably did the damage for Ballygunner in the early 2022 All-Ireland final and this time it was Ben Stafford who clinched a landmark Leinster club SHC title for St Martin’s, their first ever.<\/p>\n
Henry Shefflin’s Shamrocks were chasing a 13th provincial title and hadn’t lost a game in Leinster since slipping up to another Wexford side, Oulart-The Ballagh, way back in 2012.<\/p>\n
They went on a 15-game winning streak in Leinster after that but Stafford brought it to an abrupt end, firing over the stoppage time point this evening to make history for Martin’s.<\/p>\n
There was a huge performance too from Man of the Match Jack O’Connor who scored six points from play.<\/p>\n
Rory O’Connor was at his very best as well, blasting 11 points on a landmark occasion for the Daithi Hayes managed Wexford champions.<\/p>\n
Level five times late on, extra-time loomed but Rory O’Connor’s 62nd minute score tied it up for the eighth time in the game, providing the platform for Stafford to take his potshot at glory.<\/p>\n
St Martin’s advance to an All-Ireland semi-final against Munster champions Ballygunner on the weekend before Christmas.<\/p>\n
But it’s the end of the road for Shamrocks who will perhaps rue the absence of Kilkenny star Adrian Mullen due to a broken thumb suffered earlier in the Leinster campaign.<\/p>\n
Ballyhale came to Croke Park armed with a distinguished provincial record, winning 24 of the 26 games they’d played in the province since their breakthrough county title win of 2006.<\/p>\n
And they hinted initially that they might make it win number 25 in that period with relative ease.<\/p>\n
They had 1-4 on the board after just nine minutes and already led by five points in a repeat of the clubs’ 2019 meeting.<\/p>\n
TJ Reid looked totally tuned in from the off, driving over a free from the half-way line and slotting another shortly after.<\/p>\n
And as a team Shamrocks appeared desperate to put daylight between the team as quickly as possible.<\/p>\n
Cody went close with one goal chance – David Codd intervened for St Martin’s with a last ditch hook – before eventually finding the net in the ninth minute.<\/p>\n
Brian Cody rose up with a terrific catch above his man before laying off to Cody and while he had Joe Barrett and the goalkeeper between him and the net, the county star still got a precise strike away.<\/p>\n
Shamrocks should have kicked on but couldn’t and, surprisingly, only added another three points in the entire half, and just two from open play.<\/p>\n
Jack O’Connor came alive for St Martin’s in the second quarter and, along with the power and industry of his brother Rory, and cousin Barry, they forced the nine-times All-Ireland winners onto the back foot.<\/p>\n
Between the 18th minute and half-time, they drew a series of frees that Rory O’Connor happily converted at the Davin End and, overall in that period, they outscored Shamrocks by 0-7 to 0-1.<\/p>\n
It was some turnaround and left the Wexford men, contesting the club’s 10th ever Leinster club championship game, leading at half-time by 0-11 to 1-7.<\/p>\n
The margin was out to four points early in the second-half as Martin’s reeled off three more points in succession; Rory O’Connor, Jack O’Connor and Codd again doing the needful.<\/p>\n
Shamrocks briefly got it going between the 37th and 40th minutes and outscored St Martin’s by 1-3 to 0-1 in that time.<\/p>\n
Cody conjured the goal opening, bursting through the centre and laying off to his right for Niall Shortall to convert.<\/p>\n
But no sooner had Shefflin’s crew got back ahead, 2-10 to 0-15, than Martin’s applied the heat again.<\/p>\n
Jack O’Connor, Michael Coleman and Rory O’Connor all picked off eye-catching points from acute angles out on the wings.<\/p>\n
The final quarter hour or so was an intoxicating back and forth with the sides level not less than five times, it was hard to see how it wouldn’t require an additional 20 minutes to separate them.<\/p>\n
But Stafford held his nerve in the eye of the storm, capitalising when the ball was played out from a ruck of players to him to hit the 63rd minute winner at the Hill 16 End.<\/p>\n
\n St Martin’s scorers: Rory O’Connor 0-11 (0-8f), Jack O’Connor 0-6, Michael Coleman 0-2, Darren Codd 0-2, Barry O’Connor 0-1, Joe Barrett 0-1, Ben Stafford 0-1.<\/p>\n
\n Shamrocks Ballyhale scorers: TJ Reid 0-6 (0-5f), Eoin Cody 1-2, Niall Shortall 1-2, Brian Cody 0-2, Richie Reid 0-2, Evan Shefflin 0-1, Paddy Mullen 0-1, Dara Mason 0-1.<\/p>\n
\n SHAMROCKS BALLYHALE: Dean Mason; Killian Corcoran, Joey Holden, Dara Mason; Eoin Kenneally, Darragh Corcoran, Richie Reid; Evan Shefflin, Ronan Corcoran; Liam Barron, Eoin Cody, TJ Reid; Paddy Mullen, Brian Cody, Niall Shortall.<\/p>\n
\n Subs: Dylan Aylward for Barron 51, John Fitzpatrick for Ronan Corcoran 57, Conor Phelan for Shefflin 60.<\/p>\n
\n ST MARTIN’S: Callum Quirke; Eoin O’Leary, Conor Firman, Joe Barrett; Philip Dempsey, Daithi Waters, Diarmuid O’Leary; David Codd, Aaron Maddock; Darren Codd, Jake Firman, Jack O’Connor; Michael Coleman, Barry O’Connor, Rory O’Connor.<\/p>\n
\n Subs: Ben Maddock for Coleman 50, Ben Stafford for Jake Firman 59,<\/p>\n
\n Referee: Chris Mooney (Dublin).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Leinster Club SHC final: St Martin’s (Wexford) 0-24 Shamrocks Ballyhale (Kilkenny) 2-17\u00a0 Not for the first time, a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":219371,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[76],"tags":[18,22,129,19,17,119,132],"class_list":{"0":"post-219370","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-eire","9":"tag-football","10":"tag-hurling","11":"tag-ie","12":"tag-ireland","13":"tag-sport","14":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115675539987596297","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219370","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=219370"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219370\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/219371"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=219370"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=219370"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=219370"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}