AIB Ulster Club Senior Camogie Championship final
Loughgiel (Antrim) v Liatroim (Down) (tomorrow, the BOX-IT Athletic Grounds, 2pm)
TWO interesting statistics around this game is that both sides are bidding to win the provincial title for the sixth time and meeting each other in the final for the third time.
It’s one win each to date, but their paths have not crossed since the late 1990s, when the Fontenoys competed in six successive finals, losing the 1997 version to Loughgiel.
For the past two decades, Down has been graded as an intermediate county, while Antrim’s winners have always been senior.
The change this year has come about as a result of Clonduff winning their second national intermediate crown and therefore bringing their county up to senior status.
A year ago it would have been a brave person betting that Liatroim, and not Clonduff, would contest this decider. Clonduff had just beaten them by 4-15 to 0-4 in the Down final.
While they were probably not quite as bad as that scoreline suggests, the new father and son management team of Paddy and Domhnall Nugent faced a huge challenge to get them back as contenders for a county title they last held in 2016.
Their season, however, has been marked by gradual progress. Although they won the Division One league title, they lost the final game to Portaferry. They also lost the last of their championship group games to Portaferry, this time by a point in a real feisty encounter.
That put them on course to meet Clonduff in the semi-final in Hilltown. Liatroim took the game to the title-holders and edged through with a point to spare. The winning margin was the same in the Down final, when they came from behind to deny Ballygalget a first title.
Current Down players Dearbhla Magee and Aimee McAleenan have really stood up during that run, while former county stars Kelly Duffin and Karen McMullan, who won their first senior championship medals over two decades ago, rolled back the years to guide their less experienced team-mates.
They now face a much bigger challenge from Loughgiel, who ran Sarsfield’s from Galway close in last year’s All-Ireland final.
The Shamrocks have lost Maeve Connolly, Úna McNaughton and Mary McKillen to long-term injuries during the course of the season. Full-back Katie Lynn had to be taken off in the early stages of the second half of the Ulster semi-final win over Slaughtneil a fortnight ago and her season would also appear to be at an end.
When she left the pitch, Slaughtneil held a three-point advantage. Loughgiel’s defence excelled in her absence, however, and kept their opponents scoreless until injury-time, by which stage Róisín McCormick and Caitrín Dobbin had accumulated enough scores to win the game.
They are a team, and a club, on a mission. It is 40 years since their hurlers won the first of their two All-Ireland titles and the aim is for the camogie team to go one better than 12 months ago to collect their first national title.
Beating Slaughtneil for the second year running was a big statement and there are very few outside the Liatroim club giving the Down champions any chance of upsetting the apple-cart.
Apart from the cutting edge of Dobbin and McCormick, there is a solid experienced crew there. After all, this is their 10th successive Ulster final.
Veterans Charlene Campbell and Emma McFadden were two of their semi-final stars, while the work-rate of current Antrim players Maria Lynn, Amy Boyle, Lucia McNaughton, Christine Laverty, Anna Connolly and Katie McKillop ensures that Dobbin and McCormick get plenty of opportunities to take on defenders for scores.
It wouldn’t have mattered who had come out of Down this year, facing either Slaughtneil or Loughgiel was always going to be a big step up.
Verdict: Liatroim have been no pushover this season and, as long as a gap doesn’t develop early in the game, they can make it into a battle. However, Loughgiel are expected to have an easier game than any of their last three and should win with something to spare.
