Diarmuid Nash claims his second Nationals crown, whilst Catriona Casey romps home in another ruthless performance!
Tuamgraney's Diarmuid Nash certainly had to do things the hard was en route to his win this weekend, making the title even more sweeter, defeating the last two All-Ireland Champions and surviving a tiebreak QF with his doubles partner Colin Crehan.
Nash looked sharp all weekend in fairness, dispatching 2016 Minor Champion Sean Kerr before seeing off Crehan on Saturday night. Having won the opening game in Sunday mornings SF against Charlie Shanks, the match could not be finished as Shanks had to withdraw with an injury mid way through the second.
The second SF saw pre-tournament favourite Robbie McCarthy take on 2017 Minor Champion Tadhg O'Neill, and the young Cork man really rose the challenge, giving McCarthy a stern workout before the Mullingar mans experience and guile saw him make late surges in both games to win out 15-8, 15-9.
In the final it was McCarthy that took the opener 15-10 before Nash replied 15-9 to force a gripping tiebreak. Leading 9-4, a brilliant power serve to the right spun down along the wall to give Nash a very timely ace, and he followed that up with victory at his first chance, sealing the crown 11-4.
"I was not really sure how I was going to perform coming into the Nationals, it has been four weeks since the Golden Gloves, but I have trained hard since. I felt I could give it a real good go though and it just got better as the weekend went on as I felt sharper and sharper" stated Nash.
"My SF win over Charlie was a bit anti climatic given his injury withdrawal, but maybe it helped keep me a bit fresher for the final. I hoped for a fast start in the final, but that didn't happen, so I slowly but surely had to play myself into the game and thankfully came out on the right side."
In the Ladies section, Irish #1 Catriona Casey was in no mood for hanging around as she kept all three of her opponents to below 5 aces in every game.
One of the matches of the tournament came in the second SF as Martina McMahon took on Aisling Reilly. McMahon blitzed Reilly 15-0 in the opener but Reilly changed up her play and was a controlled winner in the second, 15-6. The tiebreak is when the real fun started though as Martina came from 10-9 down to win an epic 11-10, with the crowd enthralled.
The final was a repeat of the Golden Gloves and recent Tucson Pro-Stop Finals, with the scores standing at one win apiece. But Cork's Casey was simply brilliant and avenged her recent defeat in devastating fashion, keeping McMahon to 15-1, 15-3.
"I really enjoyed the tournament, I was just in the zone and performing well. In Tucson I went back to bad habits and half swinging at the ball, and tipping it around. Today I was hitting the ball a lot harder and I was serving well too. I was struggling in training during the week, but maybe it was the adrenaline that kicked in and thankfully things went my way."
GAA Handball would like to sincerely thank all the host Clubs in Mayo and their volunteers for their huge effort in running off another succesful event.
See below for full list of results across all the grades.
Finals Results:
- Men’s Open – Diarmuid Nash (Cla) dft Robbie McCarthy (WM) 10-15, 15-9, 11-4
- Ladies Open – Catriona Casey (Cork) dft Martina McMahon (Lim) 15-1, 15-3
- Men’s 23 & U – Cian O’Conghaile (Gal) dft Patrick Murphy (May) 15-11, 15-10
- Ladies 23 & U – Doireann Murphy (Cla) dft Niamh Dunne (Lao) 15-11, 15-5
- Men’s A – Galen Riordan (Wex) dft Jordan O’Neill (Ant) 15-8, 15-13
- Men’s B – Ciaran Burke (May) dft Denis Creigton (Ros) 15-8, 15-7
- Ladies B – Cora Doyle (Wex) dft Siobhan Tully (Ros) 15-2, 13-15, 11-2
- Men’s C – Conor Noone (Gal) dft Michael O’Malley (Cor) 15-9, 15-7
- Men’s Challenger – James Stanners (Wex) dft Stephen Smullan (Kild) 13-15, 15-9, 11-10
- Men’s 35+ – Vinny Moran (May) dft Ollie Conway (Gal) 15-3, 15-4
- Masters A – Dominick Lynch (Ker) dft Paul Graham (Ant) 15-4, 15-7
- Masters B – Sean Jennings (Ros) dft Pat Murphy (Lim) 15-12, 4-0 ret. inj.
- Silver Masters A – Niall Kerr (Tyr) dft Edward Bourke (Kilk) 15-0, 14-15, 11-2
- Golden Masters A – Paddy Donovan (Lao) dft Tom Sweeney (May) 15-4, 15-6
- Emerald Masters – Michael Rossiter (Wex) dft John Hedigan (Cor) 15-8, 15-12
- Diamond Masters – Kevin Geraghty (May) dft Antoin Ó Braoin (Wex) 6-15, 15-7, 11-2
- Ruby Masters – Eugene Kennedy (Dub) dft John McCullagh (Tyr) 15-8, 15-9
Plate Results:
- Men’s Open – Gavin Buggy (Wex) dft Paul Moran (Kild) 21-19
- Ladies Open – Pauline Gallagher (May) dft Avril McNamee (Don) 3-3 ret. inj.
- Men’s 23 & Under – Gearoid O’Connell (Cor) dft Conor Walsh (Cor) 21-13
- Men’s A – Seamus Ó Conghaile (Gal) dft Ian McLoughlin (May)
- Men’s B – Kevin Barrett (Car) dft Caolan Smith (Cav) 21-17
- Ladies B – Laura Mannion (Ros) dft Linda Seoighe (Gal) 21-7
- Men’s C – Aidan O’Flaherty (Tip) dft John Hurley (Cor) 21-6
- Men’s Challenger – Daniel Riordan (Ker) dft Stephen Finnegan (Dub) 21-19
- Men’s 35 & Silver Masters A Combined – Patrick Foy (May) dft Pat Murphy (Gal) 21-6
- Mast. A, Gol. & Eme. Mast. A Combined – Shane Bruen (Sli) dft John Cawley (Cla) 21-7
- Masters B – Gerard Coleman (Sli) dft Liam Masterson (May) 21-14
- Diamond & Ruby Mast. Combined – Peter Larkin (Mon) dft Gerry O’Fatharta (Gal) 21-15