Hungry Knockmore end era for Eire Og

OF COURSE we hadn't read our history. We should have known that if the All-Ireland club championships belong to anyone it is to the teams with momentum. Thus the jaded legs of Eire Og stopped running in Mullingar yesterday. Knockmore went bounding into the final.

The losers first. Their contribution to this competition has been of such romantically epic proportions that they deserved better then this. In fact they owed themselves better than this. They took their bow not in style but in despair. A few statistics tell the tale. Eire Og failed to score from play yesterday. They had two players sent off in two minutes. They had to replace two of the three players in their full-back line.

For Knockmore the occasion was one of pure celebration. From the throw-in till the final whistle they were utterly dominant, dictating the play with a confidence which matched their physical superiority. Days like this are rare and treasured.

They made a couple of tactical switches in their forwardline before the gamer began and each one worked sweetly. Padraig Brogan and Ray Dempsey swapped places. Right half-forward Declan Sweeney moved into the centre forward position and played well forward, being on hand to pick up every knockdown from the full-forward line. The Knockmore full-forward line had 3-5 from play yesterday. Sweeney added three points of his own. End of story.

If a game so one-sided could be said to have had a turning point it came in the second quarter. Shane Sweeney dropped a clever ball in behind the Eire Og full-back line; Ray Dempsey had breached the line already and swung soccer style from 15 yards for the game's opening goal. Kevin O'Neill added a point soon after to give Knockmore a six-point lead.

Eire Og rallied, but Anthony Keating missed an easy free before scoring a more difficult one minutes later. Then Brendan Hayden lofted a ball to the edge of the Knockmore square, where Tom Nolan flicked it on confidently. Somehow, coming off his back foot, Knockmore goalkeeper Pat Reape made a tremendous save.

Thereafter, Eire Og looked like a badly-winded team. The Mayomen scored the next three points, the last of them illustrating cruelly just how deficient Eire Og were.

Kevin Staunton, who had a superb game, took the ball down under pressure at mid-field. His full-forward line was spreading itself as per usual and the Eire Og defence looked in a state of panic. instead of launching the quick pass in Staunton flicked outside instead to Joe Davis, the overlapping wing back, who sallied through for a perfect point.

Knockmore took an eight-point cushion into the break.

By then, of course, the game looked over. Eire Og had been deprived of the industry of centre forward Jody Morrissey before the game. To add to their woes, several old reliables failed to click yesterday. Garvan, Ware and Hughie Brennan were swamped at midfield. Muckle Keating had an off day and Colm Hayden, though called out to centre forward before half-time, never made an impact. Only wing back Joe Murphy left any impression on the collective memory of the 10,000 crowd.

Eire Og in their heyday will be remembered for the lovely short passing movements with which they used to embroider their scoring.

Knockmore are a different breed of team altogether - big enough and fit enough to play an attractively pure sort of football. The defence thrives on mutual understanding and a clear tactical vision. The ball is worked patiently into the middle third of the field by means of a series of handpasses and then delivered quickly to the full-forward line.

The forwards are big enough to cope with any type of ball, but for most of yesterday afternoon they got a supply which arrived at chest height on just about the 21-metre line. No forward could be heard complaining about that. They turned and scored or flicked the ball back towards their half-forwards. They always had an option.

In midfield, too, they are massive and dominant. Staunton is a fine footballer and if he shaded the award for most influential midfielder yesterday he did so only with the tireless assistance of Declan Dempsey, who did much of the donkey work.

Whatever hope Eire Og had in the second half yesterday seemed to evaporate when Staunton won clean possession from the throw-in and launched an attack. The Carlow side attempted to clear but Darren Moore was blocked by Padraig Brogan, who took the point himself.

Shane Sweeney added another point before Eire Og gave away a terrible goal. Staunton released another long pass, the Carlow defence hesitated and Ray Dempsey caught and handpassed to Kevin O'Neill, who just had to beat the goalkeeper.

O'Neill was a revelation yesterday - back to the sublime form which won him an All Star not too long ago. The smallest of the full-forward line, he moved the quickest, picking up all the loose possession and constantly making himself available at the end of moves.

His goal left Knockmore 13 points clear with 24 minutes left. As so often happens at this stage of this gruelling competition, some of the losers opted for settling scores rather than taking them. In the final 10 minutes John Owens and Willie Quinlan were both dismissed for throwing punches at Fergus Sweeney.

By then they had suffered the indignity of seeing Ray Dempsey score a goal of such insouciant brilliance that it bordered on arrogant. Knockmore had been tossing the ball around in front of the Eire Og goal for some time before it reached Dempsey out on the right. He made as if to take his point but chipped the goalkeeper instead. The ball had shaken the net and the green flag had been raised before many in the ground realised the nature of Dempsey's sorcery.

A team from the west has seldom come to Croke Park for a national final with a head of steam comparable to Knockmore's.

Eighteen points to spare and a performance of unsurpassing confidence. They have harnessed the momentum. They will be hard to beat.