Kingdom conquer Mayo ladies in All-Ireland semi-final

TG4 All-Ireland ladies Senior Football Championship semi-final

Mayo 1-11 Kerry 1-16

Oisín McGovern in Thurles

AN awesome display from Kerry legend Louise Ní Mhuircheartaigh saw Mayo meet their match in the All-Ireland senior football championship this afternoon.

The 32-year-old from Corca Dhuibhne shot 1-10 in a scintillating display to which Mayo had no answer.

An excellent first half from Kerry proved to be the winning of a game in which Mayo were wasteful at times.

The Connacht champions hit 1-6 in the second half, but simply had no answer to the unstoppable Ní Mhuircheartaigh.

Michael Moyles’ ladies held their own against the Munster champions in the first eleven minutes, where saw the sides shoot 0-2 apiece.

However, a full-on Kerry bombardment saw an error-prone Mayo side ship 1-7 over the next nine minutes.

Louise Ní Mhuircheartaigh and Hannah O’Donoghue - the two best players on the field - accounted for all but 1-5 of this.

Unsurprisingly, it was that pounced for Kerry's only goal in the 18th minute when she palmed Danielle O'Leary's pass into the net.

Kerry were totally dominant during the period, with Mayo struggling to break out of their own half.

Sinéad Cafferky and Ciara Needham doubled Mayo’s tally before half-time, at which point they were trailing 0-4 to 1-10.

The Munster champions had to do without the impressive Hannah O’Donoghue in the second half due to injury.

However, Ní Muircheartaigh continued to impress and nearly bagged a rasper of a goal towards the end, but her shot grazed the top of the crossbar.

Mayo’s voices were raised briefly in the 45th minute when Aoife Geraghty set up substitute Deirdre Doherty to bury a goal with a minute of her coming on.

The Connacht champions made a few daring charges at the Kerry goal but were impeded by a well organised and tenacious Kerry defence.

Their shooting did them no favours though – they had eight wides racked up by the full-time whistle.

Michael Moyle’s gave it their best, but an Ní Muircheartaigh-inspired Kerry ran out five-point winners in sunny Thurles.

Read the full match report plus reaction from the Mayo camp in Tuesday’s Mayo News.

Mayo: L Brennan; S Lally, C McManamon, D Caldwell; É Ronayne, C Needham (0-2), K Sullivan; A Geraghty (0-1), T O’Connor; S Cafferky (0-2), R Kearns (0-1), S Mulvihill; T Needham, L Cafferky (0-1), S Howley (0-3, 2f)

Subs: S Walsh (0-1) for Mulvihill (26), L Wallace for O’Connor (44), D Doherty (1-0) for Kearns (44), M Cannon for T Needham (52), F McHale for Howley (59)

Kerry: C Butler; E Lynch, K Cronin, C Murphy; A O’Connell, E Costello (0-1), C Lynch; L Scanlon, L Galvin; N Carmody, N Ní Chonchúir (0-1), A Galvin; H O’Donoghue (0-3), D O’Leary (0-1), L Ní Mhuircheartaigh (1-10, 4f)

Subs: A Harrington for O’Donoghue (HT, inj.), M O’Connor for Galvin (47), C Evans for Ní Chonchúir (54), E McGlynn for Carmody (66)

Referee: M Farrelly (Cavan)