Heartbreak for TU Dublin as UCC march to the Sigerson Cup final

The Dublin side’s run of wins has come to an end as University College Cork proved too strong

It was not to be for Technological University Dublin as their fairytale Sigerson Cup journey came to a heart-breaking end as University College Cork (UCC) claimed their spot in the gaelic-football final against University Limerick (UL).  

The final score of the game was 1-12 to 0-13 in favour of the Cork college after a hard fought and well-deserved win.  

Coming off the back of TU Dublin’s two unexpected wins over both former title holders UL and strong favourites University College Dublin (UCD) in the quarter finals, the next step for this group of young men was UCC. 

Both teams boasted a number of inter-county players from across Ireland.  

The game got underway in Dr.Cullen Park in Carlow with both sides eager to get the first score on the board as referee David Gough blew the whistle for the beginning of the game.  

Both squads from the throw in were playing with maximum intensity and hunger for victory.  

It took only five minutes for UCC’s danger man, county senior player Cathal O’Mahoney, to get the first score of the game with a wonderful hook kick which led to TU Dublin’s first score less than a minute later, coming from midfielder Ryan Deegan after he caught a long ball in and called his mark for a shot on goal.  

The game was end to end, with both sides working relentlessly to maintain or retain possession of the ball.  

Weather conditions began to affect the playing styles of both teams as rain began to fall causing the pitch to be much slippier and leading to many shots from both sides to fall short and to drop into the goalkeeper’s hands.  

Following a shot that dropped short from O’Mahoney, TU Dublin’s goalkeeper Darragh Brooks saved a potential goal and the Dublin college’s defence dealt with it well.  

In the 24^th minute TU Dublin made the first substitution of the game, with Ryan O’Dwyer being replaced by Jack Flynn.  

The UCC defence was relentless and left very little space for the TU Dublin forwards to get any shots off.  

Up the other end, TU Dublin’s defence was consistently solid but right before the half time whistle, UCC’s Dylan Ganey scored a classy goal into the bottom right-hand corner of the net to make the scoreline 0-4 to 1-7 in the Cork college’s favour.  

After the break, the rain began to clear up however the pitch was evidently still extremely wet and slippery, but this did not affect the UCC men from beginning the second half with intensity and urgency to get a point to widen their lead.  

TU Dublin responded well with corner forward Robbie McCallister’s shot dropping short for the follow-up shot to be saved brilliantly by the Cork man Dylan Foley.  

Around 37 minutes into the game, the tides began to turn as TU Dublin began to dominate possession of the ball and got three consecutive points with no UCC response, bringing the scoreline to 1-9 to 0-8.  

As the rain began once more, the UCC defence began to come alive again with each player being extremely well disciplined and aggressive in their tackling.  

A UCC counter-attack almost saw a second goal for the Cork men after TU Dublin goalkeeper found himself caught out of position and centre-forward, Shane Cunnane managed to pull off a spectacular goal-line save. Unfortunately for the Dublin college, this was not enough as UCC shut down any opportunity of a last-minute goal by piling all 15 men in their own half to win the game and book themselves a spot alongside UL in the 2023 Sigerson Cup final.  

The final of the Sigerson Cup will be played in the Waterford Institute of Technology Sports Campus grounds on Wednesday February 15 between UL and UCC.