Corofin end Vincent’s All-Ireland dream

COROFIN (Galway) 1-14 ST VINCENT'S (Dublin) 1-9

St Vincent's dream of back-to-back AIB All-Ireland Club senior football championships was extinguished by Galway's Corofin in Saturday's entertaining semi-final at O'Connor Park, Tullamore.

The Connacht champions looked the fresher side over the hour and were inspired by forwards Michael Lundy and Ian Burke, who both kicked four points from play, and caused the Vincent's full-back line torment throughout.

Vincent's lined out without the injured Kevin Bonnie and Daithí Murphy with Gavin Burke starting at centrefield which reduced the driving impetus that the Dublin U21 can provide for his Marino side.

The early exchanges were evenly balanced but it took a fine Michael Savage save in the tenth minute to deny Martin Farragher a goal and it was an early portent of the challenge a well-drilled Corofin were going to present.

Vincent's weren't the usual fluid side and a couple of handling errors cost them at times with the energetic and alert Corofin forwards only too happy to clinically punish their opponents.

The opening half concluded in a welter of excitement. Firstly Gary Delaney slammed a penalty off the Vincent's crossbar in the 23rd minute when his side were 0-7 to 0-5 in front.

Two minutes later Tomás Quinn converted from the penalty spot after Ciaran Dorney was fouled and when Brendan Egan pointed, following good interplay with Quinn, Vincent's were 1-6 to 0-7 clear.

However, the first half drama was not finished there as the highly influential Lundy set up Farragher for a Corofin goal in the 30th minute for the Galway men to enter the break ahead by a point, 1-7 to 1-6.

Points from Lundy and Burke extended Corofin's advantage before a controversial call by ref Padraig Hughes when he let play go on after Corofin corner-back Ciaran McGrath dived on the ball on the ground as Dorney's shot looked set to run into the net.

A Burke free two minutes later compounded Vins woes but points from Diarmuid Connolly (two, one free) and Quinn (free) cut het deficit to two points with just over ten minutes remaining.

Burke again responded with a pointed from Corofin before Vincent's went close to raising their second green flag but Burke's effort went across face of goal and wide on the far side.

With it when their best chance of pulling the game 'out of the fire' as Corofin progress to the final on St Patrick's Day in Croke Park, Vincent's did keep working to the finish but scoring efforts looked tired as their 27-month Championship winning streak was brought to a halt.

SCORERS - Corofin: I Burke 0-5 (0-1f), M Farragher 1-2, M Lundy 0-4, G Sice 0-3 (0-3f). St Vincent's: T Quinn 1-1 (1-0 pen, 0-1f), D Connolly 0-3 (0-1f), R Trainor 0-2, C Dorney, S Carthy, B Egan 0-1 each.

COROFIN: T Healy; C McGrath, K Fitzgerald, C Silke; D Burke, L Silke, A Burke; G Higgins, R Steede; G Sice, G Delaney, M Farragher; M Farragher, M Lundy, I Burke. Subs: D Wall for Steede (53), J Burke for Farragher (61).

ST VINCENT'S: M Savage; Cameron Diamond, J Curley, H Gill; B Egan, G Brennan, M Concarr; E Fennell, G Burke; Cormac Diamond, D Connolly, S Carthy; R Trainor, C Dorney, T Quinn. Subs: T Diamond for Cormac Diamond (36), G Murphy for Dorney (41), E Brady for Concarr (55).

REF: P Hughes (Armagh).