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Victorious Antrim manager Darren Gleeson hopes his Joe McDonagh Cup winners can start and make an impact at next year’s Leinster Championship after they overcame Kerry’s steadfast determination in Sunday’s final at Croke Park.
The Kingdom provided familiar foes on the card on the final day of All-Ireland, but the weight of expectations seemed to weigh heavily on the side of the Saffrons that had won the previous three meetings this year.
Kerry led by a point in the interval, but Antrim’s class said after the restart and they prevailed by a score of 0-22 to 1-17.
“There was pressure to win it, when you have three wins over a team,” Gleeson told RTÉ Sport after the final whistle.
“They came and set the tone early, they weren’t going to allow us to break the lines and have all the scoring opportunities that we’ve had all year.
“For them, fair play worked for 35-40 minutes, but then once we got into our rhythm and the nervousness was gone from our system, I thought we played really well for 12-16 minutes.
“There was an expectation that the boys would come here that stifled them a bit.
“We knew it wasn’t going to be easy. I was delighted that we could move on. We did enough in the end, I know you can look at our last quarter and it wasn’t spectacular and it wasn’t the showcase people are looking for, but it was enough for me. Once we have that cup, I am delighted. ”
Antrim’s return to elite hurling and the Liam MacCarthy Cup next season presents a daunting task, but it is one that will be embraced.
“It depends on the players, me as a coach and my team, what we can do in the future. And it also depends on the Antrim board.
“They have been fantastic all year. Time to be behind the players too. Invest in Antrim.
“There is a huge investment in infrastructure at Antrim.
“We’re not sleepwalking into anything. There’s a big gap in the levels.
“You will see that between the first game and the second game.
“But there is only one place to close that gap and that is the training ground.
“If the guys buy back and say we’re going to get the cut right on this, I think we can make our mark.”
For Captain Conor McCann, it was the most welcome victory at headquarters.
“Antrim teams have struggled at Croke Park for the past few years,” he admitted.
“We canceled that today.
“We were one point behind at half-time and we came back very strong in the second half, so we are delighted.
“You have to win the finals, but we are happy with the way we came back in the second half. The first half, we had a bit of trouble.
“We will be proud to return to the Leinster Championship next year and compete with the so-called ‘big teams’.”
While many experts ruled out the Kingdom’s chances before the throw-in, McCann never did.
“We knew Kerry was going to be a really competitive team to play.
“Any of the games we had played so far had a ball puck between the two teams.
“We knew Kerry was going to throw everything at us.”
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