Promotion to Leinster Championship within touching distance but Offaly on high alert for Carlow ambush

OFFALY will have a gilt edged chance of promotion back to the Leinster Senior Hurling Championship when they take on Carlow in the Joe McDonagh Cup final on Saturday.

However, they will certainly not be counting any chickens before they are hatched and will be on high alert for an ambush by the underdogs.

Memories of last year's Joe McDonagh Cup final group game defeat by Carlow are still painfully fresh for many of the squad.

Offaly were flat and subdued on the day as Carlow ended their ambitions of making the final.That defeat signalled the end of Michael Fennelly's reign as manager as the Offaly County Board opted for change, appointing one of his coaches Johnny Kelly in his place. It would have been wrong to replace Fennelly had Offaly reached the final but the defeat by Carlow left him on a tightrope and it was not a big surprise when Offaly opted to go down a different road.

Under Johnny Kelly, Offaly have been very solid, doing everything that has been asked of him. They are playing well, near enough to the best of their ability and they have achieved their primary aims for the season to date. They have won promotion back to Division 1 of the National Hurling League and they have reached the Joe McDonagh Cup final.

A win in Saturday's final will fulfill all their season's goals and it is within touching distance. Offaly's form has earned them the tag of favourites but a tantalising extra ingredient has been thrown into the mix by their defeat by Carlow in their last group game.

No one in Carlow or Offaly will be reading one iota into the 1-29 to 0-14 result as Carlow qualified for the final. Four wins in their earlier games against Laois, Down, Kildare and Kerry had secured Offaly's final place and they opted to field a near second string team against Carlow.

Only Ben Conneely, Killian Sampson, Dara Maher and Paddy Delaney had started in the win over Kerry the previous week and the Offaly side included a number of players making their first championship appearance of the year: Conor Hardiman, Eoghan Parlon, Conor Langton and Cathal O'Meara.

The team that was selected could not beat Carlow, though their performance was certainly disappointing. You would have hoped they would have been more competitive, that some players would take the opportunity of really firing on all cylinders and giving the management headaches for the final. John Murphy did show enough moments of skill and pace to show that he could offer something off the bench in the final and he has featured in earlier games but outside of that, no one really stepped forward.

It is doubtful if Johnny Kelly and his management team, however, will be ruling people out of the equation on the basis of Saturday's display and performance. A couple may have damaged themselves but it is a game that has to be taken with a grain of salt.

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It was a real dead rubber with nothing at stake and Offaly made too many changes to give any newcomers or fringe players a genuine opportunity to impress. Fringe players always stand the best chance of impressing when thrown in among a largely settled, first choice team and the side selected to play Carlow was nothing of the sort.

It meant that Offaly were on a hiding to nothing. The selected team did appear to go through the motions but that may not have been the case. They came up against a full strength Carlow team with a final place at stake and with the best will in the world, they weren't going to win the game.

Offaly's selection of such a weakened team has been the subject of considerable debate in Laois and many in the neighbouring county would love for them to fall flat on their face in the final. In a sort of perverse way, this scrutiny should actually be a positive for Offaly. A Joe McDonagh Cup final is sufficient motivation in itself but this factor does provide another extra incentive for Offaly to perform.

Of course, such factors are always intangible and it all boils down to who plays well and performs on the day.

Offaly did the right thing with the team they selected for the final round. It was absolutely none of Laois's or anyone else's business what team Offaly put out. They had given themselves that luxury by virtue of their four earlier wins and securing their final place with a round to go.

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Offaly may have had niggly injuries that day but if they had to win, you can be sure that most of them would have been got right for last Saturday week. However, that urgency wasn't there and Offaly have come through a gruelling fixture list. They had a run of games on seven weekends in a row and last Saturday week was their ninth fixture in ten weeks. There might have been a two week gap from that to the final but Offaly's only duty that day was to themselves and their players.
A lot of other counties would have done the same thing, and Laois have not always fielded their strongest team in the past when they have had that freedom to try out players.

Even if Offaly had opted to put out their strongest team, with the best will in the world, they would not have got their intensity levels up to the normal standard, knowing that they could afford to lose. Laois or no other county would have been any different in that situation. Offaly were entitled to rest players, to avail of the opportunity to recover well and train hard. They were also better off to lose with a severely weakened team than a near full strength one.

All of that, however, is a sideshow now but Offaly will have availed of the opportunity to have a close look at Carlow. Johnny Kelly was less animated than usual in Carlow. There was no point in being anything else but apart from that, he was probably concentrating more on what the Carlow players were at than anything Offaly players were too – though he will of course have noted the individual displays of Offaly.

Offaly know what Carlow are about anyway. Carlow have earned the right to respect in hurling and they have had their share of victories over them in recent years. Some of these went down like a lead balloon in Offaly but that day has passed and defeats by Carlow or anyone else no longer come as a big shock to the system.

However, he now has very fresh evidence of the ability of some of the Carlow players. The excellence and quality of Martin Kavanagh in attack, the scoring threat of James Doyle and some of the Nolans; the ability of Kevin McDonald and Conor Kehoe to power through and cover ground at midfield, the physicality of Diarmuid Byrne at centre half back.

He will also have seen the limitations of some players, the wrong options they took when there was no real pressure on and the ball they coughed up when there was pressure was on. He knows which players can be exposed in the white heat of a big championship final and this game will be much different.

It is an exciting time for Offaly hurlers. This year's U-20s and last year's minors have created a welter of optimism in the county. The seniors have also added to the feeling of health. Some of these players will not be there when the outstanding younger generation graduate to the county team over the next two-three years. Some will have come to their natural end, a couple may drift away and others won't make it.

The long serving Shane Dooley will be finished at that stage and he owes no one in Offaly anything while David King is also nearing the end. The likes of Ben Conneely, Ciaran Burke and Eoghan Cahill to name a few should be on the team for a good few years yet and there are plenty of others who will be still there well into the decade.

Some will be gone but the challenge for all the current players is to perform to the best of their ability, to show the class they have and to make a compelling case for staying. They all have that potential and this team is representative of the work rate and desire that is prevalent among all Offaly teams at the moment. It is a great thing to witness and it is a huge factor in Offaly turning corners in both codes.

It would be great to get back to the top flight and stay there for the younger generation coming onto the scene. That is the next target on Offaly's road to hurling redemption and they have that in sight now.

Offaly will be in no way cocky about this final or taking Carlow in any way for granted. There may be a view among some supporters that they are better off playing Carlow than Laois in the final but that just doesn't matter. Carlow will be very hard to beat and it will take a huge Offaly display.

At the same time, Offaly are favourites on merit and it will be disappointing if they don't win. Offaly's 1-19 to 1-12 league win over Carlow is a more important barometer for judging this final than the Joe McDonagh Cup one but Carlow have improved considerably since then and they will relish playing in Croke Park.

It is near enough a 50-50 game. Cillian Kiely is Offaly's big injury doubt. He received a bad shoulder injury late on against Kerry and Offaly could really do with his physicality and power. He brings something different to the Offaly table and with more work on his fitness, he would be a real force to be reckoned with.

Expect the Offaly team to be similar to the one who started against Kerry. Most of the team have been in good form and while there are selection calls to be made, there is no real case for making changes. Almost every player has earned his place – Dara Maher has availed of his opportunity in defence, Jason Sampson had adapted to life in centre back like a duck to water, Adrian Cleary is growing with confidence in attack with every game and Brian Duignan showed what he is capable of when hitting two spectacular points early in the second half when the pressure was on against Kerry – he is another who brings something different to the table and that type of unpredictability can be a great asset to a team.

Carlow are certainly capable of winning this and will fancy their chances but the odds favour Offaly. The Joe McDonagh cup defeat won't have done Offaly any harm. A loss of that nature is never a good thing but Offaly had too weakened of a team for it to count.

There are some concerns about Offaly. Some players are well capable of blowing hot and cold and Offaly have shown in the recent past that they can lose big games when not expected to. Carlow last year and Down in the Christy Ring Cup semi-final two years earlier spring instantly to mind. However, they do look to be more consistent this year and have been very solid.

They are doing the simple things well, playing to a plan and they have big game players capable of grabbing this by the scruff of the net. The impression remains that if Offaly and Carlow play to the best of their ability, Offaly will win, albeit after a fierce battle. They can return to the top flight this weekend.