Worth the wait for Gearoid Ryan

By Shane Brophy

“We are a long time waiting for it,” admitted Templederry captain Gearoid Ryan who had the honour of lifting the Seamus O Riain Cup, the first time the club had won a championship at senior level.

“You can see what it means to the people, it’s unreal,” as Templederry folk, young and old, savoured the club’s greatest achievement on the hallowed sod of Semple Stadium.

And they did it with a composed performance, not getting into their flow until the second half when they showed everyone why they were the best team in the competition this year.

“We were probably a bit nervy at the start which was to be expected but in that third quarter we really took off and a gap emerged,” Ryan added.

“Our last three performances are probably as good as what we strung together in a long time. There is a belief after coming into the team, so we just stuck to what we were doing all year and came good.

“We spoke all week about sticking to the process and we have a system, and they did pull us around a bit in the first half, but we said at half time to get back to what we were good at which is creating space inside in front of Seanie (Ryan) and we did the rest.”