All-Ireland Club champions have no answer to Moran inspired Mitchels
By Cian O’Connell
A gripping game that was buzzing along at a decent clip had entered the 45th minute when the decisive blow was landed. Barry Moran, who ruled the midfield exchanges, loaded the bullet for Neil Douglas to pull the trigger.
Castlebar Mitchels plundered a second goal and from then until the finish Corofin were in trouble, especially following the dismissal of Martin Farragher. Afterwards Corofin manager Stephen Rochford acknowledged Douglas' intervention was vital.
"It is fair enough to say the second one killed the game off,” Rochford remarked. “I know Dougie finished it, but it was disappointing that at that stage you were just looking at trying to get yourself back ahead to see if you could stretch the game open. It never materialised that way."
Castlebar's cool composure in closing the deal impressed Rochford, who admitted Corofin were soundly beaten when Farragher was sent off for a second bookable offence. “I think that is a key strength of theirs anyway,” Rochford commented about Castlebar's storming finish. “They are a team who are very comfortable on the ball; they will create space.
“Offering up an extra man was an absolute death sentence for us. These things happen, a guy picks up a second yellow card there is nobody to blame for that. They closed out the game. With 20 minutes to go unless we got some sort of lucky goal because we weren’t creating anything inside, we didn’t look like we were going to win that game.”
Man of the match Moran contributed 1-2, while also crafting space for Douglas' major, and Rochford accepted the Mayo centrefielder had been the key figure. “He was a magnet for the ball. We just couldn’t seem to bypass him. We might have made more from one or two more opportunities in the first half. Barry scored a very, very good goal into the narrow side on the goalie. He was the most dominant player on the field without a doubt.”
For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.