Crowley makes haven safe

Cork SFC Final: Castletown 1-9 Clonakilty 1-7 Castlehaven captured their third Cork senior football championship title with a deserved win over Clonakilty at Pairc Ui Chaoimh yesterday, their first success since 1994.

The winners had an unlikely hero in right corner forward Colin Crowley, who was man of the match with 1-4 from play and this despite not having played since the semi-final win over Douglas, in which he suffered hip and stomach injuries.

Indeed, the Cork player's participation was in doubt until he passed a fitness test days before the game, but Crowley shrugged off his lack of preparation to give a masterly display, including his side's only goal, after 36 minutes.

This stemmed from a loose cross-field pass out of defence which fell to Paudie Hurley, who immediately picked out the unmarked Crowley 14 metres from the Clonakilty posts. He waited for goalkeeper Eamon Harte to advance from his line before firing a crisp, right-footed shot to the corner of the net.

This sparked Castlehaven's best spell, as they went on to score four unanswered points to enter the final quarter 1-9 to 0-4 in front. Stephen Connolly (two), Hurley and Crowley found the range to seemingly put Castlehaven out of range.

Clonakilty, whose last title came in 1996, refused to yield and managed to hold their opponents scoreless as Castlehaven lost their composure. Conrad Murphy started the fightback with a 49th-minute point before full forward Padraig Griffin blasted in a terrific goal four minutes later, soloing past two defenders before letting rip with a drive across goalkeeper Lee Miles to the far corner of the net.

The gap was now down to four points, 1-9 to 1-5, and a Murphy free within 60 seconds set up an exciting finish. The same player dropped another free short and Colin O'Donovan blazed wide from a scoring position as Castlehaven clung on.

Two minutes into injury time substitute Conor Murray pointed to reduce the deficit to two points, but time ran out on Clonakilty's challenge moments later, signalling wild celebrations among the Castlehaven support.

The first half was a tense affair with Murphy opening the scoring after three minutes, but it took Castlehaven 14 minutes to get on the scoreboard, courtesy of a Crowley point. Connolly edged them in front a couple of minutes later only for a Brendan Walsh point and a Murphy free to restore Clonakilty's lead, 0-3 to 0-2, after 21 minutes.

The switch of Niall Cahalane from midfield to centre forward in a direct swop with Alan Crowley helped Castlehaven gain a stranglehold. Two Colin Crowley points in quick succession and a beauty from Bernie Collins gave them a 0-5 to 0-3 interval lead.

CASTLEHAVEN: L Miles; A Sheehy, L Collins, captain, D Cahalane; T O'Leary, R Cahalane, P Loughnane; D Hurley, N Cahalane; F Cahalane, A Crowley, S Connolly (0-3); C Crowley (1-4), B Collins (0-1), P Hurley (0-1). Substitutes: D Burns for N Cahalane (injured), B Deasy for F Cahalane, Brian Collins for Bernie Collins.

CLONAKILTY: E Harte; T O'Sullivan, D O'Brien, C O'Neill; N McCarthy, N Hayes, captain, D Lyons; B Walsh (0-1), Tony Anglin; K Meade, C Murphy (0-5), C O'Donovan; S Quirke, P Griffin (1-0), Timmy Anglin. Substitutes: M Griffin for McCarthy, J O'Mahony for Timmy Anglin, H Kenny for Tony Anglin, C Murray (0-1) for Meade, C Calnan for Quirke.

Referee: D Linehan (Cork).