Offaly beat Antrim to keep spot in Leinster next season

Leinster SHC: Offaly 3-15 Antrim 1-16

Offaly lived very dangerously before securing their status in the Leinster SHC with a nerve-racking win over a gutted Antrim at O’Connor Park on Sunday afternoon.

A five-point winning margin is a slim one in hurling but this game was a lot tighter than this suggests as Offaly lost their way in the second half and Antrim almost pulled off a sensational against-the-odds win.

With relegation at stake for the losers, this was a huge, high stakes game and it was frantic stuff, played at a huge intensity.

Antrim will wonder what would have happened if corner back Niall O’Connor had not been red carded in the sixth minute after Charlie Mitchell went to ground. Playing with a strong wind to their backs in the first half, that sending off was a devastating blow for Antrim and it was probably the losing of the game.

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While the swirling wind made things difficult, it was clearly favouring Antrim in the first half when they really needed to be a few points up. Instead they found themselves trailing 2-9 to 0-11 at half-time and you would have put your house on Offaly coasting home.

Offaly made the perfect start with a great first-minute goal from Brian Duignan and were 1-1 to 0-2 up when O’Connor was sent off. It was all squad at 0-4 to 1-1 when Dan Ravenhill got Offaly’s second goal from a penalty in the 13th minute, awarded for a foul on the brilliant Mitchell.

Antrim dug in and two James McNaughton frees cut the deficit to a point but three in a row put Offaly 2-4 to 0-6 ahead after 22 minutes. Antrim fought back well with four on the bounce, three of them from play, to level it up at 0-10 to 2-4 after 29 minutes and were in a position to push on.

Offaly's Cathal King tackles Antrim's Eoghan Campbell. Photograph: Leah Scholes/Inpho

Offaly, however, were strong in the first half, controlling a lot of the play and finished positively as Mitchell floated over two great points for that very satisfying four point half time lead.

Offaly were 2-13 to 0-13 up midway through the second half and Antrim showed fantastic character to bring it down to the fire. Three McNaughton frees cut it to a goal, Mitchell put four in it again and then McNaughton brought the visiting crowd to their feet with a 64th-minute goal.

All the momentum was with Antrim, but Offaly’s response in the face of adversity was encouraging. Stephen Rooney denied Duignan a goal before Killian Sampson rattled the Antrim net in the 66th minute.

Duignan converted a free to put Offaly 3-15 to 1-16 up with three minutes left plus two minutes of injury time. That proved to be the winning margin as Offaly managed to defend intense late pressure from Antrim to take the win.

OFFALY: M Troy; C Burke, B Conneely, C King, R Ravenhill, D Shirley (0-2), S Bourke; K Sampson (1-0), C Spain; D Bourke (0-1), B Duignan (1-7, 7f), O Kelly; D Ravenhill (1-2, 1-0 pen), C Mitchell (0-3), J Sampson.

Subs: J Clancy for D Ravenhill (h-t), E Cahill for Jason Sampson (63 mins).

ANTRIM: R Elliot; C Boyd, P Burke (0-1), N O’Connor; C Bohill, J Maskey, S Rooney; G Walsh (0-2), N Elliot (0-1); S Walsh (0-1), E Campbell, R McCambridge (0-1); E O’Neill, J McNaughton (1-8 8f), K Molloy (0-2).

Subs: R McCloskey for McCambridge (54 mins).

Referee: M Kennedy (Tipperary).