All-Ireland Final Replay Report

  Despite losing out by five points in the end to Crossmaglen there were many ifs and buts which could have changed the result in our favour. It's true to say that our opponents were the better team on the day but how would they have fared had they lost one of their players in the 45th minute who was left play on even though he received two yellow cards?. They did lose a player a few minutes later and if they were down to 13 they would have found it hard to use their swarm defence which is quite legal and which they do so well.At the end of the day our tally of just one score, a goal in the last forty minutes was our undoing.We attacked for most of the third quarter but the afore mentioned goal was all we had to show for the pressure we exerted. We were outplayed in the final quarter and our opponents added on five unanswered points.

  We got off to a very bad start and were down three points after eight minutes as our opponents dominated the exchanges. We settled down very well after this initial onslaught and had five points without reply by the 20th minute and an 0-5 to 0-3 lead. We lost our grip on the game once again in the last ten minutes of the first half as Cross had four unanswered points even though playing against the stiff breeze to put them ahead 0-7 to 0-4 at the interval.

 We brought the game to our opponents right through the third quarter, but our only award was a great goal by David Moloney from a sublime pass by Colm Cooper in the eight minute followed by a missed penalty a minute later. The last quarter was eventful mainly because of the non application of the yellow cards from our point of view but our opponents must get credit for taking their chances, with five match winning points , some from long distance.

 One could say that our unproductive periods, the ten minutes before half time and the third quarter of the game cost us dearly. Our congratulations to Crossmaglen on winning their fourth All Ireland title.

 Team and Scorers; Kieran Cremin; Keith McMahon, Luke Quinn, Mike Moloney; Batt Moriarty, Brian McMahon, Eanna Kavanagh; Ambrose O'Donovan, Eoin Brosnan; Brian Looney, Shane Doolan, James Fleming (capt); Colm Cooper 0-3(0-2frees), David Moloney 1-0, Kieran O'Leary 0-2. Subs; James Cahillane, Kieran Brosnan, Brian McMahon.