ST BRIDES 0-16
CLAN NA GAEL 1-12

St Brides claimed the Louth U-21 title when the held on to defeat Clan na Gael by a single point in Darver on Saturday night.

At the end of an entertaining second half, the Knockbridge side held their nerve and two late points from Kevin Hearty proved decisive as his side made up for the disappointment of losing last year's final.

St Brides, aided with a stiff breeze, dominated the initial stages of the game and opened the scoring with a pointed side-line kick from Patrick Reilly after five minutes. Points from play followed from Kevin Hearty, Emmet Kirk and a free kick from full forward, Cathal Mc Kenna, to race St Brides four points clear with ten minutes played.

Clan na Gael finally got off the mark with a Robert Curran point on 11 minutes, when a goal was at his mercy and that sparked a revival that saw his side reduce the gap to 0-5 to 0-4 just after the quarter hour.

However, St Brides moved up a gear before the break and fired over points from Reilly, Emmet Kirk (2) and McKenna to lead by 0-9 to 0-4 at the interval.

Straight from the restart Hearty latched onto a long ball punted into the full forward line to slip another point over and extended St. Brides lead to six points. As the teams then traded scores, it was looking good for the village men as they held a 0-12 to 0-7 advantage after 42 minutes.

However, Clans refused to give up and battled back into contention before pulling themselves level when a goalmouth scramble resulted in the ball going into the net off a Brides defender to tie things up at 0-14 to 1-11.

The game was balanced on a knife edge for the last few minutes of the game. However St. Brides kept their composure and two points in a minute from danger man, Hearty, gave St. Brides some breathing space with full time soon approaching.

Deep into added time, Clan na Gael needed a goal to steal it. However dogged defending by the more experienced St. Brides meant that all the Clans could manage was a pointed free right at the death to leave St. Brides victors on a score line of 0-16 to 1-12.

Gareth Hall was presented with the Under 21 Championship Cup by County Board Chairman, Padraic O'Connor, where he thanked all players, management and committee for making the year gone by a success.

This cup brings St. Brides total to three cups for the season adding to the Division 4B League and Junior 2A Championship Cups.

ST BRIDES: Darren Breen; Sean Mc Donnell, Cillian Kirk, Aidan McNally; Paraic Marry, Andrew Smyth, Richard Halpenny; Gareth Hall, Patrick Reilly (0-2); Ross Kehoe, Emmet Kirk (0-4), Michael Keane; Kevin Hearty (0-5), Cathal McKenna (0-4), James Costello (0-1). Subs: Paul Halpenny for S. Mc Donnell, Conor Deane for R. Halpenny, Sean Brennan for P. Marry, Aaron Devin.Subs not used: Alan Meegan, Stephen Kettle, Jarlath Cassidy, Paraic Mackin, James Collins.

CLAN NA GAEL: Sean Smith; Ian Carr, Donal Boyle, Jason Murphy; Conor Mackin, Ola Olajabu 0-2, Kevin Carroll; Conal Cooney, Conor Noonan; Darragh Connolly, Robbie Curran 0-3, Gavin Gaffey 0-2; Mark Newell 0-1, Ciaran O'Connor 0-2, Conall McKeever 0-2. Subs: Paraic McKeever for D Connolly, Michael McDonald for P McKeever, Craig Long for J Murphy. Tweet

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