Junior B Hurling Championship Final

Ardoyne v All Saints – 7-00pm Dunsilly

Tonight’s (Friday) Junior B Hurling championship final at Dunsilly brings together two sides that will need no introduction to each other. Kickham’s Ardoyne and All Saints Ballymena finished first and second respectively in Division 4 of the ACHL, the North Belfast men finishing two points ahead of the Ballymena men.

Both sides recorded a home win against their opponents in a fiercely contested league campaign with Ardoyne coming out tops at the ‘Crickey’ and All Saints gaining a little bit of revenge with a win at Slemish Park

That game in Ballymena saw Naomh Uile claim a thrilling victory over Ciceam Ard Eoin in a fiery, top-of-the-table clash at Slemish Park. The home side secured two vital league points to keep their title hopes alive, halting Ardoyne’s chance to virtually wrap up the silverware.

In the end it wasn’t enough as the Kickham’s went on to claim the title and will go into tonight’s encounter as slight favourites but they will face a stern challenge from the Ballymena side.

Ardoyne took a time to get going in their semi-final win over Loch Mor Dal gCais at Cliftonville and the North Belfast side trailed 0-2 to 0-8 to the Loch Shore side at the halfway stage and looked in trouble.

The Kickham’s sprang to life however in the second half and gave immediate notice that they were going to have a say in this game, racing into attack and winning a free that was duly pointed by Patric McGreevey. A tense free-taking shoot-out ensued between McGreevey and Turley, with McGreevey taking the honours to drag Ardoyne back to within two points by the 50th minute.

Aaron Stewart began to exert a major influence on the game, landing a long range point from play for Ardoyne. When the final whistle blew for normal time, the sides could not be separated, locked at 1-13 to 0-16.

With Loch Mór reduced to 14 men and Ardoyne finally finding their rhythm, extra time belonged entirely to the home side. With Heaney providing his trademark high-energy game and sharpshooter McGreevey in lethal form, Ardoyne completely shut up shop, keeping Loch Mór scoreless throughout the entire period of extra time. Paul McGuigan’s tireless hard work throughout the afternoon was justly rewarded with a point from play to cap off the scoring.

Patric McGreevey top scored for the Kickham’s and Aaran Stewart, Paul McGuigan, Jim Og McAuley, Paul Baker and Cormac Barnes are just some of the names that Ardoyne will be pinning their hopes of completing a league and championship double on.

All Saints will have something to say about that. They had a fairly comfortable win over Belfast Saints in their semi-final at Woodlands but will know that Ardoyne will provide a much stiffer test in the final.

Ronan McAlister, Dwayne McKee, Robert Crooks, Luke O’Rawe, Damien Kelly, Cormac and Jack Magill and Archie McGreevey are just some of the names leading the All Saints challenge but they are likely to be without Pearse Martin and Eoin McGuigan who both missed the semi-final through injury.

Ardoyne will start as slight favourites but if All Saints can put their best game together then there is unlikely to be much between them at the end.