A glorious evening on Jude’s magnificent Tymon Park pitch was the venue for the final group game of the Intermediate All-County championship. While progress to the knockout stage involved a number of permutations, a win for current county champions would see us through. A big crowd had assembled to witness this long-awaited encounter including a few oul’ codgers and Cats. These lads had made the perilous trip across the Dodder into enemy territory and stuck together for security, they mumbled through webbed fingers concealing their true loyalties. The opening exchanges were keenly contested with neither team managing to create decent scoring opportunities. Space was at a premium and the tackling was hard. The opening score of the game came from the boot of Conal which was quickly followed by another point. Judes responded to keep the narrowest of margins between the teams coming up to the first water break. From a perfectly delivered pass, Boden notched the first goal with a shot that rolled gently into the corner of the net. The game remained tight with both attacks faltering in the face of well-organised opposition defences. Approaching half time a speculative shot taken under pressure found its way past the diving Jude’s goalkeeper to increase the Boden lead. Now that a gap had appeared between the teams Boden managed the second half to restrict Jude’s who had a lot of possession to a handful of shots. Both teams were set up well defensively but it didn’t detract from the contest – there was powerful running, manly defending and lots of passion from both teams, as one would expect in a local derby. In the end Boden were deserved winners having benefitted from strong performances by Oisin Byrne and Harry Colclough.
Next up is a quarter-final date with Clontarf.
Report and photo by Donal Monahan.
Panel: Josh Kane, Conor Hanrahan, Cian Mellett, Bob Dwan, Fionn Maguire, David Gannon, Oisin Carolan, John Murphy, Neil Hester, Declan O’Mahony, Ronan Long, Colly Dunne, Ruairi Kirwan, Davy Keogh, Evan Flanagan, Cian Murray, Mark Walsh, Ollie Brophy, Scott Cullen, Ste McGrath, Oisin Byrne, Harry Colclough, Conal Keaney, Jake Turley, Ciaran Duggan, Rob Cullen, Luke Byrne, Ciaran Kiely, Michael Dunne, Davy Keane, David Leach, Eoghan Gannon, Robbie O’Reilly, Mal Codd.