Royals rule

Freeman can’t save hurlers

Round 1
Meath  0-16
Mayo   0-12

Adrain Hesson
Navan

THE Mayo hurlers travelled to Navan on Saturday to open their Christy Ring Cup campaign, and came away losing by four points in what was a free-ridden and frustrating game for players, mentors and supporters alike. Meath just about did enough, with their superior point-taking ability from open play being the difference between the sides.
“The most disappointing thing is that there were a few scores which we gave away too easily,” coach Pete Finnerty said afterwards. “And we had nine wides in the opening half when we had the wind. There was a time in the game when we had the upper hand ... halfway through the first half – and we seemed to be hurling with a bit of fluency. But we didn’t take the scores up front and didn’t create any goal-scoring chances.”
The opening half of this tie was a free-ridden affair with Cavan referee Brendan Sweeney in a ‘whistle-happy’ mood, to the annoyance and frustration of many present. In addition, his issuing of two early dubious yellow cards to Keith and Pearse Higgins left the Ballyhaunis brothers watching their respective backs for the remainder of the game.
Of the 15 points in the first half, 11 came from placed balls. Meath’s Niall Hackett recorded five of these, while Mayo’s Adrian Freeman hit over six dead balls, which accounted for all of his side’s total in the opening period. While Freeman was in excellent form from frees, Mayo squandered many other scorable chances from play, shooting nine wides while playing with the aid of the gentle breeze. Meath were more economical, and points from play by Ger O’Neill, Mickey Boyle, Stephen Clynch and one from Hackett himself left the Royals 0-9 to 0-6 ahead going in at the interval. 
Mayo had it all to do going into the second half and started well through two early points from Freeman. The second of these came in the 37th minute and was Mayo’s first score from play. Meath, now playing with the elements in their favour, hit their purple patch as they hit five unanswered points in five minutes (all from play) to put daylight between the sides. Pádraic Keoghan, Niall Hackett, David Crimmins and Stephen Clynch (two) were the architects of this Royal ambush, which left Mayo six points in arrears going into the final quarter.
The introduction of Ballina’s Kevin Healy into the Mayo attack had a positive effect on proceedings, resulting in Mayo points from Derek McConn and Keith Higgins (two frees). But try as they might to create a goal-scoring chance late on, it never materialised. Two points from play was all Mayo could muster in the 70 minutes of hurling, and coach Pete Finnerty agreed afterwards that this was a telling statistic.
“That tells its own story,” he said. “You can’t expect to progress in this competition only scoring two points from play and relying on a free-taker to keep you in the game. It’s the product of not having continuous competitive hurling on a week-to-week basis. We have to create more, we have to get more expansive in our forward division.”
Mayo have a chance to redeem themselves straight away as Kerry travel to Castlebar next Saturday for round two of the Christy Ring Cup. Throw-in at McHale Park is 3.30pm.

Meath
S Quinn; M Foley, E Fitzgerald, M Horan; K Dowd, A Ryan, T Fox; P Keoghan (0-1), D Crimmins (0-1); N Hackett (0-8, 5f), M Burke (0-2), S Clynch (0-3); G O’Neill (0-1), N Horan, M Cole.
Sub used: D Donnelly for Keoghan.

Mayo
M Walsh; D Walsh, A Connolly, S Coyne; D McDonnell, P Barrett, C Ryan; P Higgins, D McConn (0-1); K Higgins (0-2, 2f), C Hynes, S Broderick; N Murphy, E Madigan, A Freeman (0-9, 8f).
Subs used: K Healy for Madigan, S Ganley for Murphy.

Referee: B Sweeney (Cavan)