St Thomas' 2-12 Turloughmore 1-13
St Thomas' captured their sixth Galway SHC title in a row when they saw off the challenge of Turloughmore in the final at Pearse Stadium by 2-12 to 1-13.
It completes a remarkable run by the south Galway side who have now won all eight finals they have appeared in since reaching their first decider in 2012.
And it also completes an astonishing run for captain Conor Cooney who has skippered them to each of their six in a row titles.
Turloughmore were the only Galway side to previously string six county titles together but they came up short against St Thomas’ for the second time in four seasons.
Turloughmore, having opted to play with the wind, trailed by 1-06 to 0-08 at the interval after the champions did most of the running.
Turloughmore’s hopes of a bright start in front of 7,148 were dashed as the champions raced into a 0-04 to 0-00 lead after ten minutes with Darragh Burke notching two of them after Shane Cooney got them off the mark inside 22 seconds and his older brother Conor landed a free from distance.
Conor Walsh finally got Turloughmore off the mark with a free from the right after 12 minutes but their attack was struggling to make inroads against a solid defence from St Thomas’.
St Thomas’ struck a huge blow a minute later when Eanna Burke took down a delivery from Damien Finnerty and dispatched it to the net to lead by 1-04 to 0-01.
Turloughmore responded well with two points from Sean O’Hanlon and another free from Walsh to cut the gap to a goal after 19 minutes but two superb efforts from Victor Manso put St Thomas’ ahead by double scores.
Conor Cooney, who played a deep role against the wind, uncharacteristically missed a second free and Turloughmore finished the half strongly with another Walsh free being followed by a flurry of three points in stoppage time as they finally got moving for Jamie Holland, Matthew Tarpey and Cillian Whelan to shoot good points and cut the gap to 1-06 to 0-08 at the interval.
A Walsh free levelled the sides two minutes after the restart before they hit the front for the first time when O’Hanlon got his third of the game with a superb effort from the left.
St Thomas’ hit back and Conor Cooney tied the game with a free, their first score in 21 minutes, and then Oisin Flannery edged them in front after superbly blocking Daniel Loftus to lead by 1-08 to 0-10 after 42 minutes.
Walsh’s fifth free levelled the game going into the final quarter but then Conor Cooney sent an indirect free 50 metres back to brother Shane and he landed his second point of the clash to restore their lead.
St Thomas’ then brought in Galway’s 2017 All-Ireland winning captain David Burke, who only underwent a cruciate operation back in April, on for the closing stages.
They pushed on from there and two points from Eanna Burke and one from play by Conor Cooney put St Thomas’ 1-12 to 0-11 in front before Turloughmore hit back with a couple of points from Walsh, the latter tipped over the bar by goalkeeper Gerald Kelly to cut the gap to two.
A long sideline by David Burke saw Conor Cooney pounced to set up Eanna Burke for the goal that clinched the title despite a late rally from Turloughmore yielding a goal from a free from Galway captain Daithi Burke but it wasn’t enough to save the day.
St Thomas’: Gerald Kelly; Cian Mahony, Fintan Burke, David Sherry; John Headd, Shane Cooney (0-02), Cathal Burke; James Regan, Damien Finnerty; Evan Duggan, Conor Cooney (0-03, 0-01f), Darragh Burke (0-02); Victor Manso (0-02), Eanna Burke (2-02), Oisin Flannery (0-01).
Subs: Damien McGlynn for Manso (50), David Burke for Duggan (54), Bernard Burke for Darragh Burke (59), Conor Headd for Cathal Burke (61), Evan Brady for J Headd (65)
Turloughmore: Darragh Walsh; Dara Whelan, Ronan Burke, Mark Murphy; Vincent Doyle, Daithi Burke (1-00, 1-00f), Daniel Loftus; Tom Quirke, Sean Linnane; Sean O’Hanlon (0-03), Jamie Holland (0-01), Cillian Whelan (0-01); Conor Walsh (0-07, 0-06f), Brendan Phelan, Matthew Tarpey (0-01).
Subs: Sean Loftus for Phelan (46), Brian Connolly for Tarpey (57), Conor Shaughnessy for Quirke (63), Michael Morris for Doyle (64).
Referee: Liam Gordon (Killimor).
