All-Ireland Joe McDonagh final: Antrim 0-22 Kerry 1-17
CONOR McCann was never awarded the Antrim captaincy for delivering goose-bumped victory speeches. The quiet-natured Kickham’s Creggan clubman has always led by example on the pitch.
Once he commiserated with the Kerry players and thanked Antrim’s sponsors from the steps of Hogan, he grabbed the Joe McDonagh Cup and let out an almighty roar.
It was the kind of guttural sound that stays with you. In that moment, you got a sense of what yesterday’s triumph meant to this special group of Antrim hurlers.
What will also stay with the tiny number of people who were lucky to be in Croke Park yesterday afternoon to see the Ulstermen win their first-ever McDonagh title was McCann laying a wreath on the concrete steps of Hill 16 to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Bloody Sunday.
Some moments take your breath away. This was one of them. For once, it felt okay that the famous stadium was stripped back and empty as haunting music played.
The entire Antrim panel stood in silence at the corner of the ground where the terrible atrocity took place all those years ago before McCann made the solitary walk up the steps to pay his respects on behalf of his county.
In your finest hour, you never forget. This gesture was a genuine touch of class from Antrim.
Ten minutes earlier, when Galway referee Liam Gordon blew the final whistle, Antrim manager Darren Gleeson let it all out.
All those miles, thousands and thousands of them, up and down the road, were worth it yesterday.
Promotion back to Division One and a Joe McDonagh Cup is some return for Gleeson in his debut season.
In the immediate aftermath, the Tipperary man embraced big Domhnall Nugent and the pair rolled around on the famous turf.
It's true what they say about life being about moments.
Antrim had climbed the 2020 mountain with ferocious courage and spirit – and with boundless skill.
In the end, it didn’t matter a jot that they probably reserved one of their worst performances of a quite magnificent year for yesterday’s final.
Even though they never quite fired on all cylinders, it still would have been a travesty had they not won.
Having beaten Kerry three times already this year, there was always that gnawing fear that Fintan O’Connor’s men would land a knock-out blow on the biggest stage.
On paper, Antrim held all the aces. They had the psychological advantage of those three previous wins.
They have more technically gifted hurlers than Kerry. They have faster forwards than Kerry and on a fast pitch like Croke Park against a less mobile opponent, what could go wrong.
Well, everything. Especially in a high-stakes final.
After a reasonably bright opening quarter of an hour, the wheels threatened to come off Gleeson’s team.
A harmless high ball from Kerry’s Shane Nolan from the left side should have been meat and drink to Mattie Donnelly but the Antrim full-back misjudged its flight and Mikey Boyle couldn’t believe his luck.
The bustling full-forward collected and hammered the ball low past Ryan Elliott and into Antrim’s net which put Kerry just one behind after 20 minutes [0-6 to 1-2].
It wasn’t just the three gift-wrapped points for Kerry, it was the confidence booster it gave them.
For in the opening 15 minutes, they could do nothing right as pass after pass failed to reach its destination. It looked as though this could be the handiest out of the four encounters for Antrim.
Corner-forward Ciaran Clarke looked in the mood in the opening exchanges, splitting Kerry’s posts three times before Conor McCann thumped over another score in the 10th minute.
Kerry were all at sea – until Donnelly’s error that completely unsettled Antrim and somehow allowed the Munster side to sneak in at half-time with a one-point advantage [1-7 to 0-9].
Antrim’s lauded forwards began taking too much out of the ball and ran into trouble once too often, although Niall McKenna – one of Antrim’s best players in 2020 – saw his scuffed effort on goal cleared just in time by Kerry ‘keeper John B O’Halloran a few minutes before the break.
Of course, at the other end of the field, Donnelly could have allowed himself to be dwarfed by the occasion after his mistake.
But, to his eternal credit, the big Ballycastle man showed tremendous character to regain his composure. In his next two 50-50 duels with Boyle, Donnelly emerged with the ball.
And that’s how that intriguing sub-plot of yesterday’s patchy McDonagh final unfolded.
In the 56th minute, Kerry’s goal-getter was substituted. Donnelly had won the day.
By the 42nd minute, Gleeson had made three astute changes that vastly improved Antrim.
Dunloy attacker Conal Cunning came in for Dan McCloskey for the start of the second half and Neil McManus and Domhnall Nugent replaced Keelan Molloy and Conor McCann.
Between the 37th and 49th minutes, Antrim hit six points without reply to turn the screw on their opponents.
Nugent’s very presence made the Kerry back-line nervous, while Cunning hit two crucial points from play when Kerry threatened to get within a point of Antrim towards the end.
But the catalyst for the Saffrons was undoubtedly McManus’ introduction. Plagued by ankle and hamstring injuries, the Cushendall man could count the minutes he’s played for club and county this year.
Slotting in at midfield beside the imperious Eoghan Campbell, McManus showed no signs of ring rust by firing over a beauty from under the Cusack Stand and followed up with three nerveless placed balls that kept daylight between themselves and their opponents.
Kerry’s bench was also impressive and they almost conspired to reel Antrim in towards the end.
Padraig Boyle, Colm Harty and Brendan O’Leary tagged on important scores for the Kingdom but they could never quite make it a one-point game.
Kerry’s talisman Shane Conway was well marshalled from open play by Rossa wing-back Gerard Walsh before Phelim Duffin stuck to him like glue in the final few minutes.
Arguably the score that pushed Antrim towards the finishing line was Cunning’s wonderful 69th minute effort that needed the help of Hawkeye which put the Ulstermen three up again [0-20 to 1-17].
Kerry kept pushing right to the wire with Conway grabbing two stoppage-time points. But with six minutes of stoppage-time lapsing, the final whistle sounded and the Antrim players and management team went ballistic.
It's been an unforgettable year.
After beating Kerry in their promotion play-off in mid-October, the Antrim camp was ravaged by Covid.
Given their stretched resources, the Joe McDonagh seemed out of reach – but when they defeated Westmeath seven days later with a bit to spare, the performance showed that there was more depth to the Antrim panel than initially thought.
Gleeson kept raising the bar – and the players responded each time. Every day there were different heroes in different lines.
The half-back line of Gerard Walsh, Paddy Burke and Joe Maskey was impenetrable at times.
In midfield there was no smoother mover than Eoghan Campbell.
Niall McKenna and Michael Bradley brought an insatiable work-rate and plenty of scores to the table. James McNaughton and Ciaran Clarke were a joy to watch at times when they ran at their opponents and Conor McCann at full-forward morphed into the prolific scorer that nobody quite envisaged.
And the bench – the God-awful bench that nobody wanted to sit on turned out to be Darren Gleeson’s best friend yesterday afternoon.
The Antrim hurlers climbed some mountains in 2020. They stand at the foot of another in 2021. But Gleeson likes mountains.
On a cool December afternoon in an empty Croke Park, Antrim finally delivered. An All-Ireland title has certainly a ring to it. 'Up the Macabees'.
Antrim: R Elliott; P Duffin, M Donnelly, S Rooney; G Walsh, P Burke, J Maskey; E Campbell, K Molloy; N McKenna (0-2), J McNaughton (0-1), M Bradley (0-1); D McCloskey, C McCann (0-1), C Clarke (0-11, 0-8 frees) Subs: C Cunning (0-2) for D McCloskey (h/t), N McManus (0-4, 0-2 frees, 0-1 ’65) for K Molloy (45), D Nugent for C McCann (45), C Johnston for M Bradley (64), A O’Brien for N McKenna (70)
Yellow cards: J McNaughton (31)
Kerry: JB O’Halloran; B Murphy, T O’Connor, E Leen; J Diggins, F Mackessy, M Leane; B Barrett, P O’Connor (0-1); M O’Leary (0-2), S Nolan, S Conway (0-9, 0-8 frees), D Collins (0-2), M Boyle (1-0), M O’Connor Subs: B O’Mahony for M O’Connor (42), P Boyle (0-1) for P O’Connor (49), C Harty (0-1) for M Boyle (56), B O’Leary (0-1) for B Barrett (61),
Yellow card: M Leane (45)
Referee: L Gordon (Galway)
