It doesn’t take a game-plan or a favourites tag for Ballyea to do the business according to star forward Niall Deasy.
Named as man of the match as they collected their first ever Munster title in the club’s maiden championship tie outside of Co Clare, needless to say Deasy as he has done all year had an impact on proceedings.
He finished the hour with 0-07, two of those coming from placed balls. Niall found himself on occasion followed by Glen Rovers’ best man on the day, Graham Callinan. Ballyea’s setup is a calm one, on the sideline Robbie Hogan and Fergal Hegarty are cool customers, over the white line the likes of Deasy, Gearoid O’Connell and Cathal Doohan are no different.
This relaxed approach suits the team or so says Niall Deasy. “We don’t really have any gameplan, the lads just let us do what we want and it seems to be playing off, working it out every day and hopefully it keeps going”.
On countless occasions this year the men in Black and Amber were expected to come up short such as Round Two in the Clare SHC versus Newmarket-on-Fergus, their quarter-final clash with Crusheen, both outings against Clonlara and the Munster semi-final battle with Thurles Sarsfields.
Despite what others predict ahead of their games Ballyea refuse to accept the negative views and instead insist on setting the record straight. “You can’t even prepare for it we’re underdogs everyday and we always manage to come through”.
An All-Ireland semi-final with St Thomas’ of Galway awaits on February 5th, with their first break since winning the championship Ballyea will now get to enjoy their success while having this date on the back of their minds will do no harm says County Final replay and Munster Final man of the match Deasy.
“It’s unbelievable, it will shorten the winter for us, everything to be looking forward to it now”.