Mighty Mitchels edge St. Ciarans in titantic Mayo hurling battle

by Aiden Henry

Castlebar Mitchels have been crowned Connacht Gold Mayo senior hurling B champions following a three-point victory over a gallant St Ciarans side in the decider at Hastings Insurance McHale Park, Castlebar.

In what was a cracking and highly entertaining decider, the final was decided in injury time when Mitchels, trailing by two points, managed to score the only goal of the game as well as two late points to deny their opponents.

It was a very even opening half where no more than a couple of points separated the two sides at any one stage.

There was only 15 seconds gone on the clock when we had the game’s opening score, a point from Mitchels Colm Enright.

That lead was extended to three two minutes later after Ronan Treacy and Eoin Enright found the target.

However, St Ciarans hit back with two points of their own from Ronan Fallon and Aidan Morrisroe to make it a one-point game with just six minutes gone.

For the remainder of the opening quarter both sides traded points on three occasions before Mitchels went two in front after a great score from Ciaran Treacy.

In the second quarter the scoring dried up some what with Mitchels only scoring two points while St. Ciarans added five to their tally, with Fallon getting three and two delightful efforts from midfielder Oisin Duffy to leave them leading by one, 0-10 to 0-9, as the teams trotted off for the interval break.

On the resumption the pattern of this final didn’t change much as the two sides continued to trade points for most of the half.

As a result, this decider went right down to the wire.

St Ciarans did look like they would come out on top after James Gallagher restored their two-point advantage with just under a minute of normal time remaining.

However, Mitchels, who were without their star county player, Corey Scahill, until injury time, refused to throw in the towel.

And after Barry Lane made it a one-point game in the first minute of injury time, the winning score, a goal, arrived 60 seconds later.

It came when an attempted shot for a point by John Connor came back off a post before Pearse Murray, who was first to react, crashed the rebound to the back of the net.

Lane followed this up with a pointed free to leave a goal between the sides at the final whistle.

What a match!