Maryland defy conditions for the TV cameras but London men claim victory

It"s been quite a year for the Maryland club. Earlier in the year, they achieved nationwide fame with their victory in the RTÉ reality TV show Celebrity Bainisteoir. And a few months later, they finally regained senior status with a dramatic county final replay victory after extra-time. The extraordinary year continued last Saturday afternoon with a return to the nation"s screens and the return of Marty Whelan to Drumraney for a once-off Celebrity Bainisteoir Christmas Challenge. Joining Marty on the sidelines was comedian and presenter Patrick Kielty, the Down native taking charge of London senior champions Tír Chonaill Gaels - a team themselves in preparations for an All-Ireland quarter-final meeting with Galway champions Corofin. While the moustachioed manager proved his managerial prowess earlier on this year, Patrick Kielty himself is no slouch when it comes to Gaelic football and was part of the Down minor panel that won the All-Ireland in 1987. Saturday saw Maryland"s humble ground at Drumraney transformed. Stands were installed to cater for the large crowds; podiums were erected for the many cameras on location; a commentary box towered above the pitch from where the great Mícheál Ó Muircheartaigh offered his musings on proceedings, while TV crews patrolled every inch of the venue. Perhaps the nicest touch was the free entry to Saturday"s game. Heavy overnight rain meant that the tie itself was in danger of being postponed. But, with RTÉ producers undoubtedly eager for filming to go ahead, local farmers were brought in to remedy the situation. And in the early hours of Saturday morning, the locals got to work, extracting approximately four slurry tanks full of water from the surface of the Drumraney ground. Conditions still remained muddy with underfoot conditions extremely poor but nothing, it seemed, would stop this game from going ahead. When the game finally got going Tír Chonaill controlled the early stages of the game and took the lead after two minutes through a Kevin Downes free. The first half was to be predominantly a contest of place kicking with conditions making for a scrappy affair and with attractive football hard to come by. On 7 minutes, David Martin equalised with the first of his day"s haul of five converted frees as Maryland finally began to wake up and play a bit. Martin landed a second on 10 minutes but that was swiftly cancelled out by another Downes point from a placed ball on 14 minutes. With 16 minutes of play elapsed, Martin landed another free - this one the pick of the bunch from nearly 45 yards out. And Joe Harte took over free-taking responsibilities three minutes later to extend the Maryland"s lead to two points. But as an uneventful half of football drew to a close, Tír Chonaill hit back with two points from play - a rarity in a half otherwise punctuated by free-kicks. The first saw full-forward Dan McClusker receive a pass from Conor Beirne before pointing from a tight angle. The second came from captain Stevie Boyle who, having come up from wing-back, took a pass from Sean Meehan before pointing with his left boot. In between those scores, however, Maryland could have had a goal when a crossfield ball from James Reynolds was ran onto by David Reynolds. And having broken a tackle, David shot for goal but saw his powerful strike just miss the top corner of Brian McBrearty"s net. So the teams went in at half-time at level-pegging. A dull first-half but while score-taking wouldn"t really improve in the second period, we would at least see a slight improvement in the excitement stakes. David Martin pointed Maryland back into the lead with a fourth free three minutes into the half and, on 40 minutes, another Martin free restored the two-point lead that Maryland had held in the first half. But fare was still pretty poor, due in no small part to the heavy pitch, and with supporter interest seemingly waning, up stepped Marty Whelan to rally the troops. Marching up and down the line, Bainisteoir Whelan exclaimed to the large crowd that he thought all the Maryland supporters had gone home and encouraged the Drumraney crowd to 'make some noise'. It seemed to work. The home supporters woke up. But, unfortunately for Marty, his team were caught napping. On 49 minutes and with Maryland in possession in their own back-line there seemed to be no danger. But a seemingly routine pass from John Cunningham was intercepted by Kevin Downes. Downes spotted Dan McClusker unmarked and booted the ball to the full-forward. Once in possession McClusker took his time before burying the ball to the near corner of the net, despite "keeper John Murray doing his utmost to close down the angle. A minute later, Stevie Boyle popped up for his second point of the day and suddenly Tír Chonaill had gone from being two points down to two points up - a four point swing. Maryland struggled to find their next score until Kieran Martin landed a monster score from a sideline ball as the game ticked over into injury time. The home side pushed hard for the equaliser, but, with the three minutes of allocated stoppage-time elapsed, Kevin Downes curled over a beautiful score off his left boot to give the London champions the victory. Afterwards the Bainisteoirí embraced each other in a show of mutual appreciation. Not quite the fairytale ending for Marty and Maryland but considering the year they"ve had they won"t be too disappointed with Saturday"s outcome. Celebrity Bainisteoir: Christmas Challenge airs on RTÉ One on Sunday 28th December at 6.30pm. SCORERS - MARYLAND: D Martin (0-5, 5f), K Martin (0-1); J Harte (0-1f) TÍR CHONAILL GAELS: D McClusker (1-1), K Downes (0-3, 2f), S Boyle (0-2). MARYLAND: John Murray, Philip Rainey, John Cunningham, Conor Farrell, Ronan Farrell, Aidan Reynolds, Trevor Farrell, David Reynolds, David Martin, Anthony Reynolds, Kieran Martin, James Reynolds, Joe Harte, Thomas Browne, John Reilly. SUBS USED: Stephen Martin for T Browne (35 mins), Damien Reynolds for J Reilly (35), Richard Browne for J Harte (58). TÍR CHONAILL GAELS: Brian McBrearty, Hugh Cunningham, Daniel O"Leary, Ronan Walsh, Conor Beirne, Paddy Callaghan, Stevie Boyle, Ciaran McHugh, Gary McCluskey, Fergus McMahon, Kevin Downes, Stephen Owens, Declan Meehan, Dan McClusker, Sean Meehan. SUBS USED: Michael Maloney for S Owens (HT), Aaron Summers for S Meehan (42 mins), Andy Hayes for D Meehan (50). REFEREE: Gearóid Ó Conamha.