Ruthless Loughmore show Lorrha no mercy

GAA: FBD Insurance Tipperary Senior Hurling Championship Group 3 Round 3

Loughmore/Castleiney 3-26

Lorrha 1-17

Report: Liam Hogan at MacDonagh Park, Cloughjordan

This was the champions against a team that wanted to put their best foot forward in the knowledge that there was a relegation battle to be fought in the coming weeks.

What Lorrha gained from this experience on Saturday will be told in time but they saw a Loughmore/Castleiney team that was hell bent on winning by as much as they could.

Lorrha entered the game with full knowledge that they were preparing for a relegation battle but once the action commenced they got off to a flying start when Cian Hogan’s shot saved by Aidan McGrath but turned into the Loughmore net by a defender.

Despite playing against a stiff breeze, Lorrha held onto their lead until the 15th minute when Colm Fogarty pointed his second, 1-3 to 0-5.

However, the next three scores belonged to the holders as Noel McGrath responded with two points before Ed Connolly fired home a goal after a surging run in the 18th minute.

Frees by Colm Fogarty and John McGrath followed before Lorrha reduced the deficit with the very accurate Fogarty continuing his rich vein of accuracy from placed balls.

The champions began to find their range scoring five unanswered points through Noel & Tomas McGrath, Mikey Ryan, John McGrath (free) before Noel picked off a fabulous point from the left wing.

The seven point gap was as much as Loughmore deserved and as the half came to a close with more pointed frees from Colm Fogarty and John McGrath let the half time score at 1-14 to 1-7.

Any hope of a Lorrha revival in the second half were dashed as Loughmore had 1-2 in the bag by the third minute with John McGrath scoring their second goal thirteen seconds after the resumption before Mikey Ryan and Ed Connolly adding a point each.

Michael Dolan’s long range free and two Colm Fogarty points was Lorrha’s best scoring spell in a period where Eoin McIntyre missed two good goal chances, before Liam Treacy and Patrick Maher traded points by the 39th minute.

Loughmore looked like a team that could raise the bar at will and a run of six unanswered points through Ed Connolly, Mikey Ryan and substitute Joey Quinn plus three John McGrath frees put fifteen points between the teams on fifty minutes.

Another Colm Fogarty free reduced the margin before Loughmore moved up another gear when Quinn scored their third goal in the 51st minute.

Three frees were to follow from the usual suspects before Patrick Maher doubled his account leaving the final minutes as mere window dressing with the dismissal of Lorrha’s Ciaran Haugh for a second yellow card offence, the incident of note.

Player of the Match: Noel McGrath (Loughmore/Castleiney)

Loughmore/Castleiney: Aidan McGrath (7); Lorcan Egan (7), Joey Hennessy (7); Darragh McCahey (7); Eoin O’Connell (7), Brian McGrath (7), John Ryan (7); Noel McGrath (0-4, 8), Liam Treacy (0-1, 7); Philip O’Connell (0-1, 7), Tomas McGrath (7), Mikey Ryan (0-3, 7); Ed Connolly (1-4, 8), John McGrath (1-11, 0-9f, ‘65) 8), Paul McCahey (7).

Subs: Ed Meagher (7) for J Ryan (HT); Joey Quinn (1-1 ,7) for P McCahey (43); Ciaran McCormack (6) for T McGrath (43); Eamon Connolly (0-1, 7) for Treacy (46); Tommy Maher (6) for N McGrath (46).

Lorrha: Michael Kennedy (7); Lee Hogan (6), Ciaran Haugh (6), Tom Duggan (6); Niall McIntyre (6), Michael Dolan (0-1f, 6), Brendan Fogarty (6); Alan O’Meara (6), Eoin McIntyre (6); Christopher Fogarty (0-1, 6), Patrick Maher (0-2, 7), Colm Fogarty (0-12, 10f, 7); Conor Kennedy (6), Cian Hogan (1-1, 7), Donnacha O’Meara (6).

Subs: David Fogarty (6) for C Hogan (46); Liam Donoghue for B Fogarty (46); Conor Hogan (6) for A O’Meara (50 inj); Martin Gorman (6) for Christopher Fogarty (51 inj); Robert Duffy (6) for E McIntyre (58).

Referee: Conor Doyle (Silvermines).