Curtain Comes Down On Offaly’s Inter-County Season
All-Ireland SHC Preliminary Quarter-Final
Tipperary 7-38 Offaly 3-18
By Kevin Egan at Glenisk O’Connor Park
Warm sunshine and 10,000 supporters greeted the players of Tipperary and Offaly as they ran onto the pitch in Tullamore for this afternoon’s All-Ireland senior championship preliminary quarter-final tie, but even before the thunder and lightning rolled in during the second half, Tipperary brought electricity of their own, scything through Offaly at will during the opening 35 minutes.
In contrast to the stiflingly hot weather, the approach that the Premier County brought to Glenisk O’Connor Park could best be described as cold and ruthless, as they made light work of an Offaly side that struggled to make the step up from Joe McDonagh competition.
By the end, their tally represented the highest ever score recorded in a senior championship hurling match, eclipsing Wexford’s record from 1896, and it was also the highest aggregate total ever recorded in any game.
A strong breeze favoured the visitors in the opening half, but Liam Cahill’s side didn’t exploit it by looking for scores from distance. Instead they worked the ball through the lines and ruthlessly hunted and pounced on defensive errors from the home side, wasting no time in racking up the scores.
Five points in the opening five minutes set the tone, three of them from the stick of Jason Forde, who was making his first appearance since their draw with Cork in Munster. However once Mark Kehoe snaffled a short puckout and danced in for the game’s first goal, the metaphorical clouds were gathering for Offaly, as well as the physical ones.
Ten minutes had passed by the time Eoghan Cahill whipped over Offaly’s first point, and already Tipp were motoring with 1-7, and talk of records was beginning to gather across the stadium.
Liam Cahill’s men didn’t let up, and their scoring rate of approximately a point a minute continued. Alan Tynan, Jake Morris and Conor Stakelum shot 12 points from play between them in the first half, five each for Morris and Stakelum, while two goals in as many minutes from Jason Forde and Seamus Callanan, both of which penalised Offaly errors, helped push the lead out to 25 points with less than half an hour gone, 3-24 to 0-8.
A strong run from Cillian Kiely saw Dan McCormack pull across the Kilcormac-Killoughey player and led to Johnny Murphy issuing a black card to McCormack for careless use of the hurl denying a clear goalscoring chance, and Eoghan Cahill’s penalty gave the beleaguered home supporters something to shout about.
To Offaly’s credit, they were much more competitive for long stretches of the second half, and goals from Cillian Kiely and Charlie Mitchell kept the margin at the around the 20-point mark for long periods. Tipperary were always in control of the game and some wonderful scores from Bryan O’Mara, Morris and Forde proved that they were still a class apart, but with ten minutes to play, it looked like the game would finish with a similar winning margin to what lay between the teams at the interval.
Late in the game the heavens opened however, and Tipp rained further misery on their hosts in the process too. Two more goals from Kehoe, another from Forde and 1-1 from John McGrath off the bench made for a serious statement of intent from the Munster County, and quickly sent GAA historians diving through the record books to confirm that the final totals did indeed break new ground.
SCORERS FOR TIPPERARY: Jason Forde 2-11 (0-4f, 0-3 65s), Mark Kehoe 3-3, Jake Morris 0-7, Conor Stakelum 0-6, John McGrath 1-1, Alan Tynan 0-3, Seamus Callanan 1-0, Noel McGrath 0-2, Dan McCormack 0-1, Seamus Kennedy 0-1, Eoghan Connolly 0-1, Bryan O’Mara 0-1, John Campion 0-1.
SCORERS FOR OFFALY: Eoghan Cahill 1-7 (1-0 pen, 0-5f), Cillian Kiely 1-3 (1-1f), Charlie Mitchell 1-1, Jason Sampson 0-2, Paddy Clancy 0-1, Brian Duignan 0-1, John Murphy 0-1, Liam Langton 0-1, Paddy Delaney 0-1.
TIPPERARY: Rhys Shelly; Eoghan Connolly, Michael Breen, Craig Morgan; Bryan O’Mara, Ronan Maher, Dan McCormack; Conor Stakelum, Noel McGrath; Alan Tynan, Jason Forde, Séamus Kennedy; Jake Morris, Séamus Callinan, Mark Kehoe.
SUBS: Johnny Ryan for Morgan (47), John Campion for McGrath (47), Enda Heffernan for Maher (47), Gearóid O’Connor for Callanan (53), John McGrath for Kennedy (61)
OFFALY: Stephen Corcoran; Ben Conneely, Ciarán Burke, David King; Jack Clancy, Jason Sampson, Killian Sampson; Eimhin Kelly, Sam Bourke; Brian Duignan, Eoghan Cahill, Adrian Cleary; Cillian Kiely, Paddy Clancy, Charlie Mitchell.
SUBS: Paddy Delaney for Bourke (half-time), Eoghan Parlon for Kelly (half-time), John Murphy for P Clancy (40), Liam Langton for Cahill (44), James Nally for King (67).
REF: Johnny Murphy (Limerick)
