Mountrath CS 3-21 St Brendan’s Community School Birr 2-16
Leinster College’s Junior ‘A1’ Hurling Championship Final
Mountrath Community School have been crowned Leinster College’s Junior ‘A1’ hurling champions.
That is after they battled past the challenge of St Brendan’s Community School Birr and Storm Bram.
This game had originally been scheduled for Tullamore, then Ballinamere, but was eventually played on the 3G astro at St Loman’s in Mullingar.
With weather conditions beyond awful, Mountrath CS sought a postponement but this was not agreed to and the game went ahead.
But despite the gale force gusts, the Laois school managed to score 3-21 to be crowned champions.
This is the second time that Mountrath have triumphed at this level after previously winning in 2018 and 2023.
Those teams included future Laois seniors like Tomas Keyes, Jer Quinlan and Noah Quinlan and these lads will be hoping to emulate them.
Trumera’s Bobby O’Connor was outstanding in this win and came up with crucial scores and won frees throughout the game.
Camross duo Tadhg Lowry and Aaron Bredin, along with Borris-Kilcotton’s Paudie Fahy, were very commanding at the back.
While Ballyfin’s Conor Sweeney and Camross’ Darragh Mortimer worked extremely hard in midfield.
Mountrath played with the wind in the first half and used it to build up a massive lead.
Bobby O’Connor and LJ Cuddy were prominent in the opening ten minutes as Diarmuid Maher and John O’Meara’s charges went 0-9 to 0-1 ahead.
Tadhg Lowry was having a powerful game at centre back while Aaron Bredin pointed four times from wing back.
Jacob Hilliard, Billy Lawless and Ryan Guilfoyle also pointed in the first half while Cuddy scored a crucial goal from a penalty.
By the end, Mountrath led 1-17 to 0-2 at half time but now had to face into the gale.
Birr started the second half well with points but Mountrath struck for a really important goal via LJ Cuddy to keep his side firmly in control.
Birr kept scoring but Mountrath notched their third goal when sub John Fitzpatrick set up Luke Delaney and he made no mistake.
Birr did get two late goals but Mountrath had enough done and won by eight points in the end.
This competition does not go on to All-Ireland stage so most of these lads will move on to senior level next year.
SCORERS – Mountrath CS: LJ Cuddy 2-7, Bobby O’Connor 0-5, Aaron Bredin 0-4, Luke Delaney 1-0, Billy Lawless 0-2, Jack O’Connor and Ryan Guilfoyle 0-1 each
MOUNTRATH CS: Fionnan Gilligan (Ballyfin); Jacob Hilliard (Camross), Paudie Fahy (Borris-Kilcotton), Lorcan Holohan (Abbeyleix); Aaron Bredin (Camross), Tadhg Lowry (Camross), Leo Guilfoyle (Camross); Conor Sweeney (Ballyfin), Darragh Mortimer (Camross); Luke Delaney (Castletown), Bobby O’Connor (Trumera), LJ Cuddy (Camross); Jack Rice (Mountrath), Billy Lawless (Mountrath), Ryan Guilfoyle (Camross). Subs: John Fitzpatrick (Ballyfin), Jack O’Connor (Trumera), Ben Heffernan (Ballyfin)
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