Eoin Brislane: A dream for Monaleen to be one step from an All-Ireland final in Croke Park

JUST 14 months after suffering relegation from the Limerick SHC at the hands Monaleen are now one game away from a potential All-Ireland club IHC final in Croke Park.

“We are one step away from Croke Park,” said manager Eoin Brislane after Sunday's Munster club IHC final win over Roscrea.

“But the one thing about us this year, and as I said this during the week before the Munster final, this wasn’t on our radar at all! We are literally taking this one game at a time… like really enjoying the whole journey. We trained the other night and we just said, ‘Listen, we just want to keep this journey going’.

“The lads are really enjoying it.

“I spoke to the Roscrea lads there. People must realise that, yes Roscrea are after getting to a Munster final, but they should not be down here [Intermediate level]. They are a team that if they were togged out against Kilruane MacDonaghs in the Tipp senior final five weeks’ ago they would have rattled Kilrunae inside in Thurles because they have forwards and they’ll get better and they will improve.

“From our point of view with Monaleen, it is really all about getting back up to Senior and staying up and putting your best foot forward next year.

“Listen, All-Ireland semi-final in a few weeks’ time… isn’t it great? I don’t know much about Bray Emmets and I don’t know much about Trim, but we will go see them this weekend and we’ll take it from there and see what happens.” 

An exhibition of point-shooting from Mark O’Dwyer, who scored 0-15, 0-11 of which were frees, and a relentless second-half performance saw Monaleen shock Roscrea to become the first Limerick club to win the Munster Intermediate hurling title in 11 years.

After a nervy start, during which the Castletroy men hit eight wides in the opening quarter, Eoin Brislane's finely-tuned outfit outscored their Tipperary counterparts by 1-18 to 14 points in the remaining 45 minutes.

Brislane was delighted with how his side settled into the game, albeit boosted by a flawless performance from O’Dwyer.

“We started off nervous enough in the first five to 10 minutes – we’d no score there for five minutes,” said the former Tipperary midfielder.

“We’d a few wides and it looked like it was just pure nerves. And it looked like we were going to be rattled because of the occasion, but in fairness then we settled in.

“I just knew at half time going in a point up… we had so much possession. We had way more shots at goal so I was quite happy at half time. I felt that Roscrea, in the previous five minutes before half time is when they are most dangerous… and also in the five minutes after half time. And I felt we had the measure of them, our backs were kind of on top.”

With two minutes to go, Andrew La Touche Cosgrave won possession in the corner and, after losing his hurley, kicked the sliotar to Ed Doyle who finished to the net, putting a sudden halt to any chance of a Roscrea comeback. 

After three Roscrea scores in-a-row had brought the Tipperary champions back to within five points, Brislane admitted his heart was in his mouth until he saw the green flag being raised high in Páirc Uí Rinn.

“It was pure relief when the goal went in.. absolutely,” he said. “Roscrea are the type of team that could rattle in two goals in 60 seconds so that goal gave us that little bit of breathing space. We knew we were going to win then. There was only a minute to go so you can actually enjoy the last minute then."

But it was O’Dwyer, as if inspired from wearing the green jersey of Limerick due to a colour clash, that was the difference-maker, hitting 0-15, nine of which came in the second half.

“He was absolutely flawless today [Sunday],” said Brislane. “Sure, Mark has been flawless all year, and this is a guy who plays football for the club as well”.

“He can play off his left or right in football as well. He is just an incredible guy. He is just so laid back, casual, and calculated, and he is just gone 24 years of age – it is hard to believe.”

Brislane couldn’t have been prouder of his side, and with a return to the Limerick SHC next year, the Toomevara man believes his side are only getting started.

“There are going to be four of that team that are still going to be under-20s next year,” he said. “There are just an incredible bunch”.

“And it is not stopping. They’ve just huge, huge talent and a huge, huge will to win; and they needed to be because I knew, and the boys knew, that Roscrea were really on top form.

“If we had to give Roscrea an inch, we were in trouble today [last Sunday].

“In fairness to our boys, they stuck really into them. The scoreboard flattered us, it 100% did, but saying that we are just delighted the way the boys performed.

“My man of the match was Simon Griffin. He was sub for the last three or four matches and he came back in to do a man-marking job. We played four corner backs really. I got our backs to do a man-marking job; that’s the way we wanted to play. We pinpointed lads we wanted to man-mark, and in fairness he [Griffin] had a job marking Luke [Cashin]. Luke scored 1-6 the last day, and he [Griffin] did an excellent job on him.

“Once we settled after 10 minutes, we were fairly in control; we just needed to tap the ball over the bar and get a few scores."