Our second challenge game of the week came against Inniscarra’s neighbours Blarney in a game that was also played in our home grounds. Nobody that watch the opening ten minutes would have predicted this final score as the Blarney side raced into a four point to zero lead with White’s Cross barely able to get a shot at the goal. However, as soon the home side found their rhythm this game became very one sided with the visitors only registering two points for the remainder of the game.

After the slow start, the final 20 minutes of the first half was very impressive from a White’s Cross perspective as four of the six starting forwards scored from play. Corner forward Seán Kelly and Breandán Murnane and wing forward Killian Ryan each scored one point. Edwin Buckley at centre-forward scored a goal and a point. Edwin’s goal put his side ahead for the first time and allowed them to lead 1-04 to 0-05 at the interval.

Conor Buckley, normally a prolific scorer, had to wait until the second half to get his first score but where the first half saw the scoring distribution evenly shared, the second half was Conor’s half as he accounted for five of the six points scored in this half. Murt Kelleher scored the only other White’s Cross point in the second 30 minutes meaning that he has registered a point from midfield in each of the games so far.

Seán Kelly is proving to be the find of the season and he once again scored another fine individual goal midway through the second half which deflated what was left of the Blarney challenge. To their credit, they battled throughout but on a warm summer morning, they did not have any substitutes to make on an energy sapping morning. White’s Cross, on the other hand, had 24 available players meaning they could bring on fresh legs to bring a renewed energy to the game – something the likes of Richie Sherlock, John Gaffney and Brian O’Flynn (making his comeback after a number of years away from the game) managed to do.