2025 Intermediate Club Football final: Crossmolina Deel Rovers (Mayo) 1-12 Ballinderry Shamrocks (Derry) 0-13
“Listen, maybe what’s happened around Crossmolina, you can’t help thinking maybe it was written in the stars for them.”
The dignity and decency displayed by Ballinderry Shamrocks were again demonstrated in how they reacted to the devastating manner of this defeat.
The game was won deep into added time by a controversial penalty converted by Conor Loftus, whose fiancée Roisin Cryan tragically lost her life earlier this month.
Bell recognised that there was more to this match than football, and responded accordingly, saying:
“First of all, 100 per cent congratulations to Crossmolina. As I said in the build-up to the match, the country was going to will them to win the game and it’ll be a popular victory under the circumstances. 100 per cent hearty congratulations to them.
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“For ourselves, in terms of losing a match, that’s probably as cruel a way as it goes. You’d probably rather take a three-, four-, five-point defeat but under the circumstances and the way it finished it makes it all that wee bit more difficult. Look, that’s football, that’s sport, that’s life, that’s the way it goes.”
That crucial score, the game’s only goal, came after Ballinderry lost possession and ‘man of the match’ Niall Coggins hand-passed to the unmarked substitute Stephen Duffy – who then appeared to charge into Shamrocks goalkeeper Ben McKinless.
However, referee Sean Lonergan added a black card to an earlier yellow for the Ballinderry number one.
His cousin Daniel McKinless, a former Derry Minor keeper, went between the posts, but Loftus showed remarkable bravery and technique to slot his spot-kick just inside the left upright.
Ballinderry could certainly have questioned that match-defining decision, but Bell did not go down the route of controversy, saying:
“I wasn’t close enough to it to see, it looked like he was just burrowing his way forward but, look, we’re not going to start questioning decisions at this stage - what’s done is done.”
Instead, Bell praised the efforts of his players who had looked like adding the Intermediate All-Ireland to the Senior crown won almost 23 years ago in Thurles:
“From our lads' point of view, to be three points down and pull themselves back into the game, they showed unbelievable heart, determination and everything that we asked of them at half-time. Super proud of the boys, couldn’t ask much more of them but it’s a hard enough one to take now.”
Crossmolina boss Brian Benson had a similarly philosophical approach to the game’s crucial moment, commenting: “When we got that penalty, I turned around and said ‘It’s either meant to be today or it’s not’. It was like a defining moment of the year, it either happening or it’s not.”
Taking a point would surely have sent the match into extra time but Benson insisted they did not want that: “Not that we got the message on, but we were very adamant that it was ‘Goal, go for it’. That was how it was either going to be or it wasn’t.”
Benson had no doubts that Loftus would deliver, despite all that he has been through:
“That’s Conor. Around the funeral, he told us, he was very clear: ‘Keep training, keep pushing and driving on, make sure you’re ready to go whenever the game is.’
“It’s a testament to the man that he is to be able to change focus or even be thinking about an All-Ireland final in the circumstances.”
Amidst the joy of victory, Benson re-stated the pain that has been suffered since the death of Roisin Cryan:
“The last three weeks have been very tough on the club, very emotional. Obviously, you see Conor there, as soon as the game is over he’s bolted down the tunnel.
“While we’re all excited and delighted, our thoughts have to go to them, to Conor Loftus and the Cryans. It’s obviously really difficult for him – to see him bolt down the tunnel after winning an All-Ireland in Croke Park… It says a lot, the fact that he could come out and play for us today.”
