Tipperary 3-17
Galway 3-16

Dara Bradley

IT was always going to be a shootout. And for the loser, it was always going to hurt. And boy are Galway hurting.

Devastation engulfed the Galway players and backroom team after just falling short in a mammoth, mouth-watering quarter-final struggle with neighbours Tipperary at Croke Park on Sunday. The sight of Tony Óg Regan and captain Shane Kavanagh slumping to the sod painted its own picture. Broken men; inconsolable.

It really was a classic 70 odd minutes of hurling with 39 scores and six goals that brought the 2010 All-Ireland championship to life and will live in the memory for a long time to come. But if ever there was a match where no team deserved to lose, this was it.

Sport is cruel. And the fact that Galway hurled out of their skins and contributed handsomely to the best senior hurling match so far this season means damn all now that they are out of the championship. Out again after another hard luck story.

Yes, Galway were heroic. Yes, Galway stood up and were counted – the players didn’t duck, dive or go into hiding. Yes, Galway answered their critics with a high intensity performance. It was a display that filled Galway supporters with pride.

You couldn’t fault their commitment, honest endeavour and courage. Galway were warriors but they still lost and it’s results that ultimately matter.

Galway haven’t reached an All-Ireland semi-final since 2005 and for the second year in a row, this Galway outfit were out-hurled in the closing stages of a tight quarter-final. No amount of heroism can disguise that for the second year in a row, Galway were ahead with the finishing line in sight but managed to lose by a solitary point in a photo finish.

It’s heartbreaking because it was a match they could and probably should have won. A puck of the ball here, a decision there, a bit of luck and all would have been so different.

Leaving aside the fact that it was hard to believe Galway were even in a position to strike for victory given the aerial dominance of Tipperary’s backs against Galway’s half-forward line in particular, John McIntyre’s charges nudged two points ahead with nine minutes of normal time remaining, and just failed to seal the deal.
 

Of course referee James Owens didn’t do the Tribesmen any favours. All day it seemed Galway had to work that little bit harder than Tipperary to earn frees with fouls on Joe Canning in particular being waved on.

There were a couple of bizarre decisions that went against Galway, too – David Burke will certainly feel he was harshly pulled-up for fouling the sliotar at the start of the second half; and Ollie Canning and Donal Barry can feel hard done by for conceding frees at crucial stages when really the Tipperary men were doing the fouling. But then again, Tipp could argue Joe Canning’s penalty was a 50/50 call.

The real talking point though was the anti-climatic and wrong decision to blow for full-time in the last play of the match. What came over the Wexford referee in that final passage of play is mind boggling. Tipperary had just made a decisive scoring burst to nudge into a one point lead when Galway won a free deep inside their own half.

For more, read this week's Connacht Sentinel.