The Galway senior camogie squad were a tad unlucky last weekend in the All-Ireland semi-final, when Cork withstood a frantic last-quarter rally from Galway to win a place in the All-Ireland Senior Camogie final for the fourth consecutive season, on a score-line of 2-09 to 1-09.
The Rebels will face Kilkenny in the final.
Last year’s runners-up looked to be cruising when they went eight points clear two minutes into the second half with points from Katrina Mackey and Hannah Looney.
Surprisingly however, the Munster ladies went 28 minutes without a score and only managed one further point as Galway, driven forward by the impressive Aoife Donohue, edged back into proceedings.
Niamh Hanniffy's goal gave hope
Niamh Hanniffy came on as a sub for Galway and when she hand-passed the sliotar to the back of the Cork net after 49 minutes after a powerful bit of play, the margin was down to three and Mark Dunne's side appeared to have the momentum to go on and cause a surprise.
When Aoife Donohue slotted a free nine minutes from the end of the game, Galway were making all of the running, however, Cork defended marvellously with Rena Buckley, and Ashling Thompson holding the line to keep the Tribeswomen out.
Katrina Mackey finally ended the Rebels’ 28 minute scoring drought, right on the hour and despite five minutes of injury time and a few frantic Galway attacks, the Cork girls held out for a dramatic victory.
Cork's two goals were major moments in the game and were the difference between the sides. The first came from the penalty spot from goalkeeper Aoife Murray and player of the match, Orla Cotter also scored a splendid solo goal just before half-time.
Galway had the wind in the second half but when they went eight points clear, they seemed bound for a comfortable passage to the final.
That was to reckon without the courage and determination of the Galway players, however they had left themselves too much to do and only managed 0-5 from play over the hour which is not good enough at this level.
Cork boss Paudie Murray was impressed with Galway's performance and believes that they are a coming side - “Fair play to Galway. They have a good team. They’re coming in with a lot of good players and in time this could be a very good Galway team so you’ve got to pay credit to them."
Galway scorers: A Donohue 0-4 (3fs ), N Hanniffy 1-0, A O’Reilly (0-2, 1f ), O McGrath 0-2 each; N McGrath 0-1,
Galway: S Healy, S Dervan, R Black, T Kenny, L Ryan, R Hennelly, H Cooney, A Starr, O McGrath, N McGrath, A O’Reilly, N Kilkenny, S McGrath, M Cooney, A Donohue. Sub: N Hanniffy for M Cooney (40 ).
