AAG continued our good form in the interfirm hurling championships last night with a 6 point win over old foes Zimmer in Sixmilebridge yesterday evening.
On a perfect evening for hurling, with little or no wind and a decent playing surface, our players got on top early to lead the game with some well taken frees from Niall O’Connor and well worked scores from Gavin White, Tom O’Gorman and James Carey. Our lead was short lived however as Zimmer tacked on a few points and then opened up our defense and scored a goal past Shane Fitz mid way through the 1st half.
Order was restored with 2 points from frees by Niall O’Connor either side of a point from midfield by Gavin White. Further points just before half time from Tom O’Gorman, John Cormican and Evan McInerney saw us finish the half 4 points to the good on a score line of 0-11 to 1-4 in our favour.
The 2nd half started the same as the first with some well taken points from play from Gavin McPhilips and a free from Niall O’Connor. Zimmer rallied well in the 2nd half and brought it back to a 2 point game at one stage but our defence weathered the storm. Great sweeper play by Alan Brigdale and resolute defending from Tadhg Keogh, John O’Gorman, Richard Dorgan and Evan Mc along with two fine saves from Shane Fitz in goals kept Zimmer at bay.
A positional change from the management stemmed the Zimmer pressure as Micheal “Hallie”O’Leary went in full forward with 15 minutes to go swapping with Alan Mulready and the resulting change resulted in a goal and a point from play in 5 minutes from “Hallie” O’Leary,
Matthew Kelly (who had previously been on as a blood sub while Hallie got some treatment on a cut over the eye) came on for Eoin McMahon and ran himself into the ground. Ian Corcoran and Eoin Seymour replaced Gavin McPhilips and James Carey and injected some pace back into our game and helped us tack on 2 points from John Cormican either side of a free from Niall (I don’t miss frees) O’Connor which saw us run out a convincing win with a scoreline of 1-17 to 1-11.
The win places us nicely in to the county final awaiting the winners of Dromoland and Zimmer who play next week and guarantees us a place in the Munster Championship over to coming months. Well done to all the players and management on a great win.