Senior Football Championship: Mullingar Shamrocks 0-9 Tyrrellspass 0-13.

So that’s it then, the end of our 2017 senior championship campaign following this 0-13 to 0-9 loss to Tyrrellspass, a loss that brought with it an additional prize of demotion from Group 1 of the championship.  The demotion marks the end of an era in Westmeath football as we are accompanied in the drop by Garrycastle.

The facts behind this latest defeat are easily outlined. Micheál Curley galloped through the Tyrrellspass defence at the start to score a point and three minutes later Seanie Daly added a second from a move that began deep in the Shamrocks defence following an Eddie Moore interception and Killian Daly added a third with a great long-range effort. After seven minutes Shamrocks were 0-3 to 0-0 ahead.  Denis Glennon made a miraculous recovery from injury to open the scoring for Tyrrellspass but a move that involved Darragh Daly, Efi Siode and Dean Moore ended with a Denis Corroon special with the outside of the boot to restore Shamrocks three points advantage. Four points in the opening eleven minutes was an impressive start but inexplicably that proved to be the end of our first-half scoring. Our best scoring effort was when Kieran Gavin now playing at full-forward beat Darren Quinn to the punch but the ball rolled wide. Goalkeeper Darren Quinn pointed a ‘45’, Ben Gavin and Conor Slevin pointed from play to level matters after 21 minutes before Dean McNicholas had the final point of the half to send Tyrrellspass to the dressing rooms at half-time with an 0-5 to 0-4 ahead.

Mullingar Shamrocks replicated their first-half start when play resumed after the interval. This time it was Seanie Daly who raced away to score a point and level matters. The next ten minutes effectively sealed our fate as Shamrocks dominated but failed to register another score during this period of control.  In the eight-minute Darren Quinn stepped out of his goal to score his second ‘45’ and shortly afterwards Shamrocks suffered a major setback when Micheál Curley, received a second yellow card and as a result Shamrocks best and most combative player on the night departed the scene. Dean McNicholas pointed the resultant free, Denis Glennon hit a superb long-range free as Tyrrellspass hit a rich vein of form that also saw Cathal Dunne kick a superb score in the 44th minute. A Denis Corroon point created by an Eddie Moore surge from defence offered brief hopes of a recovery (0-9 to 0-6) but unanswered points by Dean McNicholas, Ben Gavin, David Glennon and Ray Sheridan established a match winning lead for Tyrrellspass by the sixtieth minute. Successive points by Paddy Joyce and Denis Corroon (0-2) took some of the bad look off the scoreboard but that was our only consolation on the night. Prior to these scores, Mullingar Shamrocks had scored two points in the previous forty-eight minutes on a night when five of the six starting forwards were replaced and of the original forwards only Denis Corroon registered a score. When Brendan Keena blew his final whistle, Mullingar Shamrocks were out and down. 

Mullingar Shamrocks: Philly Shaw; David Coyne, Eddie Moore, Efi Siode; Micheál Curley (0-1), Killian Daly (0-1), Seanie Daly (0-2); Kieran Gavin (Brendan O’Reilly) and Darragh Daly; Patrick Fagan (Ciarán Curley), Denis Corroon (0-4), Billy Flynn (Paddy Joyce 0-1); Dylan McDermott (David Gavin), Dean Moore (Darren Keena) and Tye Adamson (Simon Quinn).