OBVIOUSLY, given that victory in Saturday’s semi-final equated to playing in the final in Croke Park, it would have been easy for Kilbrittain to overlook the actual challenge itself.

BY JOHNNY CAROLAN

However, there was never any sense of them getting ahead of themselves in what was a hard-fought battle with Davidstown-Courtnacuddy. They had been in a similar situation prior to the Co-op SuperStores Premier JHC final – manager Joe Ryan revealed that they didn’t suppress the thoughts of what lay ahead but, equally, they didn’t lose sight of what needed to be done.

‘We used the Ballygarvan semi-final in the county as an example,’ he said.

‘We knew what came after that and it was going to be on Oisín's birthday, so there was obviously pressure with that.

‘This was a similar thing – the outcome for the winners was that the team plays in Croke Park, so we wanted to kind of acknowledge it and see what it felt like and then just park it.

‘The focus then was on what we had to do today.’

The conditions were the toughest that Kilbrittain had to contend with all year but that was never allowed to become an excuse. Having showcased their excellent attacking capabilities in scoring 2-17 against Kilrossanty in the Munster final, here they displayed another side to their game.

‘We still scored 2-15, which is very good scoring in these conditions,’ Ryan said.

‘We've shown that we've won a game by kind of a different method, so the players are adapting.

‘Even to win a game like that, in those conditions, is probably worth about 20-25 training sessions, I would say.’

Allied to the scoring output was limiting Davidstown-Courtnacuddy’s forward line. The Wexford and Leinster champions had scored 25 goals in their previous seven games but were restricted to just one green flag at the death, while Kilbrittain could have netted more than the two goals they did get through Conor Hogan and Luke Griffin.

‘Well, we knew we had threats,’ he said.

‘We knew that Luke and Conor Hogan and then Conor Ustianowski, if there was space in front of them – which Davidstown did do – we knew we had threats.

‘The first thing we said to them at half-time was that we had made three clear-cut goal chances but only taken one – so we should have had two – and they didn't create any goal chances.

‘We felt that if we were solid at that base, then we'd be in with a shout, basically, at the end of the game. If you look at the amount of points they've scored over the championships, it's been 12, 14, 15 points, roughly, but then you're topping on two or three goals to that.

‘We felt that if we could just minimise them, we had a great chance – now, look, they hit the post, we need that luck, that's the way it goes.’